China plans to complete space station with latest mission

China on Sunday will launch the Shenzhou-14 manned mission to complete work on its permanent orbiting space station in the next six months, the China Manned Space Agency (CMSA) said on Saturday.

Chinese astronauts Chen Dong, Liu Yang and Cai Xuzhe will carry out the Shenzhou-14 spaceflight mission, which will be launched with a Long March-2F carrier rocket at around 10:44 am on Sunday (China time) from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center in northwest China, the agency said.

The mission will be commanded by Chen, who participated in the Shenzhou-11 crewed spaceflight mission

Liu is also a space veteran and was China’s first female astronaut to reach space aboard the Shenzhou 9 mission in 2012.

Cai, 46, is making his first space trip.

During the mission, the crew is expected to complete the construction of the Tiangong space station with a basic three-module structure consisting of the core module Tianhe and the lab modules Wentian and Mengtian, CMSA’s deputy director, Lin Xiqiang said on Saturday.

“The quality of both the Shenzhou-14 spaceship and the Long March-2F carrier rocket has been well checked. The crew is in good condition, and the ground system facilities are in stable operation,” Lin said.

The three-member Shenzhou-15 mission – expected to be launched in December – will meet the Shenzhou-14 crew in space for rotation prior to their return to Earth, and spend about one week in space together, a state media report said.

Shenzhou-14 will be the third of four crewed missions – and the seventh of a total of 11 missions – needed to complete the space station by the end of the year.

By the time the Shenzhou-15 crew flies to the space station before the end of this year, the Chinese space station will consist of three modules, two manned spacecraft and one cargo spacecraft, with a total mass of nearly 100 tonnes.

Once the Tiangong space station is completed, China will be the only country to operate a space station of its own, which will add to its earlier accomplishments like landing on Mars in 2021 and on the far side of the moon in early 2019.

Tiangong will also be the only alternative to the two-decade-old, US-led International Space Station (ISS), which may be retired in 2024.

The ISS – from which China is excluded – comprises Canada, Japan, the Russian Federation, the US, and 11 member states of the European Space Agency.