Who are the Chinese astronauts enter Tiangong?

This Story Page List 1 2

2011-12-05 (China Military News cited from spacedaily.com and by Morris Jones) -- The successful first docking mission to China's Tiangong 1 space laboratory has cleared the path for greater things to come. The flight of the uncrewed Shenzhou 8 spacecraft demonstrated two successful dockings with the laboratory, as well as showing that this new production model of Shenzhou also works well.

Chinese engineers can celebrate this successful mission, but they will have plenty of work to do in the weeks ahead. Every mission generates rivers of engineering data, and this will all need to be examined. Although there were no obvious problems, no space mission flies without generating a few minor anomalies. There will be a clear need to check everything that went wrong, as well as everything that went right.

China's state-run media have now gone fairly quiet on the subject of Tiangong. There was plenty of coverage during the Shenzhou 8 mission, and there's probably not much to be said in the near term. But spacewatchers are eagerly awaiting the next mission. The flight of Shenzhou 9 is expected to carry the first astronauts to inhabit a Chinese space laboratory.

Chinese media statements, as well as orbital decay studies by the British analyst Philip Clark, all point to a likely time for the mission. We can expect Shenzhou 9 to lift off at some time in the vicinity of late March 2012. This will give China enough time to digest the results of the Shenzhou 8 mission and prepare the next spacecraft for launch. It also coincides with the time when Tiangong will fall from its currently raised orbit to a more accessible lower altitude.

Chinese Astronauts in Shenzhou-7 Space mission

The Shenzhou 9 spacecraft should be identical to Shenzhou 8. China has already explained that the latest three Shenzhou spacecraft are mass-production models with an identical design. They are also believed to have been manufactured in parallel. This will certainly help to reduce the turnaround time between missions.

We know the spacecraft, but what about the crew and the flight? This author believes that the Shenzhou 8 mission was more than just a docking and spacecraft test. It was carried out as a close rehearsal of the upcoming Shenzhou 9 mission.

The flight duration of roughly 17 days, with around 14 days at Tiangong, will probably be repeated. Shenzhou 8 also carried two dummy astronauts, which simulate the metabolic functions of humans. This also gives clues to the crew size. We can expect Shenzhou 9 will carry two astronauts.

Who will they be? This author speculates that the two astronauts to fly on Shenzhou 9 will be previously unflown astronauts from China's original training batch.

China's first group of astronauts is generally believed to consist of 12 men, all of whom are Air Force fighter pilots. The group was assembled in 1998. There are also known to be two astronaut-trainers who underwent cosmonaut training in Russia, before returning to pass on their skills.

This Story Page List 1 2