The annual drama of China's space station! Two crews will meet in space!

◎ Dai Xiaopei, a reporter from Science and Technology Daily

"Before the end of this year, the Shenzhou 15 crew will fly to the Chinese space station. They will meet the Shenzhou 14 crew in space. This will be a moment worth looking forward to." On March 4, Zhou Jianping, member of the National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference and chief designer of China's manned space program, answered questions from Science and Technology Daily reporters at the first "Committee Member Channel" of the Fifth Session of the 13th National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference.

In 2021, my country's manned space program fully entered the implementation stage of the space station project flight mission, and successively launched the space station core module, two manned spacecraft and two cargo spacecraft.

In the orbit about 390 kilometers above our heads, the Tianhe core module has been operating safely and stably for 10 months. The two astronaut crews, Shenzhou 12 and Shenzhou 13, have successively carried out key technology verification tasks for the space station.

On September 17, 2021, the Shenzhou 12 crew returned to Earth smoothly. "They are currently at the end of a six-month recovery observation phase. They are in good physical condition and will soon return to normal work and training," Zhou Jianping said.

On January 8, 2022, the Shenzhou 13 astronaut crew successfully completed the manual remote-controlled rendezvous and docking test of the Tianzhou 2 cargo spacecraft and the space station complex.

So far, the Shenzhou 13 crew has been in space for 140 days. During this period, Zhou Jianping has communicated with them by phone many times. "They are in good working, physical and living condition, and have completed all the planned flight missions so far. In more than 40 days, they will return to Earth from the vast space, which will also mark the successful conclusion of the key technology verification phase of China's space station." Zhou Jianping said.

"The flight of the two crews has made outstanding contributions to the verification of key technologies for the space station." Zhou Jianping said that the current flight results analysis and preliminary evaluation show that all systems of the manned space project fully meet the flight mission requirements, and the main functional performance indicators have exceeded the design goals.

Astronauts Nie Haisheng, Liu Boming and Tang Hongbo, who successfully completed the Shenzhou XII manned flight mission, arrived safely in Beijing on the mission aircraft on September 17, 2021

What other important tasks will be completed in the construction of the space station this year?

Zhou Jianping said that the space station project will enter the construction phase from May this year.

"This year, we will successively launch two space station experimental modules, two manned spacecraft, and two cargo spacecraft, and then send six astronauts into the Chinese space station. During the in-orbit flight, the Shenzhou 14 crew will welcome the arrival of two experimental modules and complete the construction of the Chinese Tiangong space station with the 'Tianhe' core module, and the 'Wentian' and 'Mengtian' experimental modules as the basic configuration. Their tasks include status monitoring and control when necessary during the rendezvous and docking and transfer process of the two modules, as well as a large amount of status setting and conversion work after docking." Zhou Jianping introduced.

"Before the end of this year, the Shenzhou 15 crew will fly to the Chinese space station. They will meet the Shenzhou 14 crew in space. This will be a moment worth looking forward to," Zhou Jianping revealed.

By then, the Chinese space station carrying six astronauts will be presented to the world. It is reported that the completed Chinese space station consists of three modules, two manned spacecraft and one cargo spacecraft, with a total mass of nearly 100 tons, carrying a large number of advanced experimental devices such as space life and biological sciences, material sciences, combustion and microgravity fluid sciences, and basic physics.

"The two crews will fly together in orbit for about a week, and then the Shenzhou 14 crew will return to the ground." Zhou Jianping said that after that, the main work of the Shenzhou 15 crew will shift to space science and applications, including the installation and debugging of experimental equipment and scientific experiments.

"Our space station has many very advanced experimental devices, which is a challenge for astronauts. At present, both crews are training intensively and hard to prepare for the flight mission. I believe that they will be able to complete the mission successfully!" Zhou Jianping said.

Source: Science and Technology Daily

Editor: Zhang Shuang

Review: Julie

Final judge: Wang Yu