Shenzhou-18 mission blasts off to China’s Tiangong space station

THE “space dream” of China continues. The world’s second largest economy sent a new crew to its Tiangong space station on Thursday April 25, Chinese state media announced. The Shenzhou-18 mission was carried out as part of a program to send astronauts to the Moon by 2030. The mission’s three astronauts took off aboard a spacecraft at 8:59 p.m. (local time) .

This crew is under the command of Ye Guangfu, a fighter pilot and astronaut who was already part of the crew of the Shenzhou-13 spacecraft in 2021. The other two astronauts, Li Cong and Li Guangsu, are making their first trip to space. They will replace the crew of the Shenzhou-17 mission, which was sent to the station in October.

A station completed in 2022

They should stay in Tiangong Station (“Heavenly Palace”) for six months, to carry out experiments in “the fields of fundamental microgravity physics, space materials science, space life sciences, space medicine and space technology”said the China Human Spaceflight Agency.

Tiangong is the flagship project of China’s space program, which landed robotic rovers on Mars and the Moon and enabled China to become the third country to put humans into orbit. The station, whose construction was completed in 2022, is expected to remain in low Earth orbit between 400 and 450 km altitude for at least ten years.