Chinese navy escort fleets hold handover ceremony for mission rotation

The 47th and 48th escort taskforces the Chinese People's Liberation Army (PLA) Navy held a mission handover ceremony in the Gulf of Aden on Saturday.

With the separation order issued, the guided-missile destroyer Baotou (Hull 133), and the guided-missile destroyer Tangshan (Hull 122) fired three green signal flares each, and all ships sounded horns, with officers and sailors waving goodbye.

Subsequently, the two taskforces turned 90 degrees to the left and right respectively.

After the ceremony, the 48th Chinese naval escort taskforce will take over from the 47th taskforce for the remaining escort missions.

The PLA Navy began conducting escort missions in the Gulf of Aden and the waters off Somalia in December 2008.

The three astronauts of the Shenzhou-23 crewed spaceflight mission have boarded the spacecraft for a flight to China’s Tiangong space station.

The Shenzhou-23 crewed spaceship is scheduled to blast off at 23:08 Beijing Time (15:08 GMT) from northwest China's Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center.

The three Chinese astronauts, commander Zhu Yangzhu, spacecraft pilot Zhang Zhiyuan and payload specialist Lai Ka-ying, climbed aboard the spaceship with the help of technicians.

Following the launch, the astronauts will complete an in-orbit rotation with the outgoing Shenzhou-21 crew, and one of them will conduct a one-year in-orbit stay, double the usual duration of previous Shenzhou missions.

Notably, astronaut Lai Ka-ying is also the first astronaut from China's Hong Kong Special Administrative Region.

Shenzhou-23 marks the 40th flight of China's manned spaceflight program, and the seventh manned flight mission since the Tiangong space station entered its application and development phase in late 2022.