JIUQUAN, OCT 30 – China declared a ‘complete success’ after it launched three new crews to the space station today as the country seeks to expand space exploration with missions to the moon and beyond.
The Shenzhou-19 spacecraft lifted off from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center in northwestern China at 4:27 a.m. local time on a Long March-2F rocket, the backbone of China’s space mission.
“The condition of the crew is good and the launch was successful,” China’s state broadcaster, Central Television announce.
China built its own space station after being sidelined from the International Space Station when the United States disagreed with China.
The team of two men and one woman will replace the astronauts who have been living at the Tiangong space station for the past six months and are expected to remain there until April or May next year.
In addition to putting the space station into orbit, the Chinese space agency has also landed a rover on Mars.
China aims to put a man on the moon before 2030 which would make China the second country after the US.
It also plans to build a research station on the moon and has already transferred rock and soil samples from a rarely explored part of the moon.
China launched its first crewed mission in 2003, becoming only the third country to do so after the former Soviet Union and the US.
The space program is a source of enormous national pride and a hallmark of China’s technological progress over the past two decades. – AP
