Manned spacecraft launch. File photoBEJING, Jun 5China's Shenzhou-14 manned spacecraft launched on Sunday from the Jiuquan Space Center in northwest China's Gansu Province, carrying a crew of three to the Tiangong Orbital Station, with China Central Television broadcasting the launch. -2F» launched in accordance with the schedule at 10.44 Beijing time (5.44 Moscow time). The crew included three cosmonauts: crew commander Chen Dong, Cai Xuzhe, and China's first female cosmonaut Liu Yang. For the crew commander of Shenzhou-14 43-year-old Chen Dong will be the second flight, on October 16, 2016, as part of the Shenzhou-11 crew, he made a month-long mission to the Chinese habitable space laboratory Tiangong-2, which was deorbited and flooded in the South Pacific Ocean in July 2019. His first and only flight lasted more than 32 days. The only woman on the crew is 43-year-old Liu Yang, who became China's first female astronaut in 2012 as part of the Shenzhou 9 crew. Her first and so far only flight lasted 12 days and 15 hours. The third crew member, Cai Xuzhe, who, although two years older than his colleagues, will go into space for the first time. The Shenzhou-14 crew will spend six months on the Tiangong orbital station and will already be the third on board the Chinese space station. Nie Haisheng, Liu Boming and Tang Hongbo were the first to arrive at the station as part of the Shenzhou-12 crew on June 17, 2021, and they returned to earth on September 17. The second was the crew of Shenzhou-13, who spent half a year at the station from October 16, 2021 to April 16, 2022, it included Zhai Zhigang, Ye Guangfu and Wang Yaping, who became the first Chinese woman astronaut to go into outer space .For the period of the six-month Shenzhou-14 mission, it is planned to complete the construction of the base three-module complex of the space station, consisting of the main module «Tianhe» and the laboratory modules «Wentian» and «Mengtian». Shenzhou 14 is also expected to have its first crew rotation in orbit, after which Chen Dong, Liu Yang and Cai Xuzhe will return to Earth this December.
China launched three communications satellites into orbitThe construction of China's Tiangong multi-module orbital station officially began on April 29, 2021, when the Tianhe main module was successfully launched into orbit. Three astronauts can be on the station at the same time or six people during a crew change. The main module of the station, 16.6 meters long and with a maximum diameter of 4.2 meters, was named «Tianhe», at the moment it is the largest spacecraft created in China. The control and management center and the main living space for the crew (about 50 cubic meters) are located here, and some scientific and technological experiments will also be carried out here. In addition to the main module, living space is also provided in the experimental ones, so its total area will be about 110 cubic meters. The main module is equipped with two docking ports for the experimental bays, as well as three docking ports for docking manned and cargo spacecraft. into space come true here
