China launches first crewed mission for space station construction

TIL Desk/world/Beijing/ China on Thursday successfully launched its crewed spacecraft, sending three astronauts to its space station’s core module Tianhe for a three-month mission. The Shenzhou-12 spacecraft, atop a Long March-2F carrier rocket, was launched from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Centre in northwest China’s Gobi Desert. The launch was telecast live.

In few minutes of the launch, the mission control announced that the launch was a complete success. It is China’s seventh crewed mission to space and the first during the construction of China’s space station, according to the China Manned Space Agency. It is also the first in nearly five years after the country’s last manned mission in 2016.

The three astronauts are commander Nie Haisheng, a 56-year-old veteran who participated in the Shenzhou-6 and Shenzhou-10 missions, Liu Boming, 54, who was part of the Shenzhou-7 mission, and Tang Hongbo, 45, who is in his first space mission.