China's latest Shenzhou-18 crew of three astronauts have successfully entered the country's space station and met with another astronaut trio in space in the early hours of Friday morning, starting a new round of in-orbit crew handover.
The Shenzhou-18 spaceship, atop a Long March-2F carrier rocket, lifted off at around 21:00 (Beijing Time) on Thursday from the launch site in northwest China, sending three astronauts to the orbiting Tiangong space station for a six-month mission.
About 10 minutes after the lift-off, the Shenzhou-18 spaceship separated from the rocket and entered its designated orbit. The crew members are in good shape and the launch is a "complete success," the China Manned Space Agency (CMSA) announced.
The Shenzhou-17 astronauts aboard the space station watched the live coverage of the entire launch process.
"We saw smooth flight throughout the launch mission, and it entered the orbit with a very high degree of accuracy. According to the evaluation criteria, the mission was a complete success," said Liu Feng, engineer from the China Academy of Launch Vehicle Technology.
The spaceship conducted a fast automated rendezvous and docking with the radial port of the space station's core module Tianhe at 03:32 Friday (Beijing Time). The whole process took approximately 6.5 hours.
At 5:04, the Shenzhou-18 astronauts entered the Tianhe module, where the three astronauts of the Shenzhou-17 mission were ready for their arrival.
Then the two trios posed for group photos and chanted the slogan: "Build a dream at the Tiangong Space Station and continue to work hard. China's space station is always worth looking forward to!"
The space get-together of the two crews kicked off the fourth in-orbit crew rotation in China's space station.
According to the CMSA, the six astronauts will live and work together for about five days to complete planned tasks and handover work.
The Shenzhou-17 crew are scheduled to return to the Dongfeng landing site in north China's Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region on April 30.
During their stay in space, the Shenzhou-18 astronauts will carry out more than 90 experiments, two to three extravehicular activities (EVAs), and implement six cargo outbound deliveries via the station's cargo airlock module.
The trio will witness the arrival of the Tianzhou-8 cargo craft and later welcome the Shenzhou-19 crewed spaceship to the space station.
China sends new astronaut trio to Tiangong space station
