China begins another giant stride in its space exploration efforts as it starts to piece together its own space station called Heavenly Harmony with the launch of initial modules on Thursday to begin the delicate process.
The module is set to lift off on board a Long March 5B rocket from the Wenchang Launch Center in Hainan. The launch is the first of the planned 11 missions that is set to put the space station into shape. The first module will bring the space station's base unit, according to an Aviation Analysis report.
Once completed, Heavenly Harmony or Tianhe, which China targets in 2022, will have a three-person crew. It weighs 60 tons and is expected to link to a Chinese satellite. Its main module is comparable to the size of the Soviet Mir Space Station and the Skylab of the US in the 1970s, the Associated Press reports.
11 Module Missions for Heavenly Harmony
Ten more launches are expected in the next months, which consists of modules for cargo shipments and actual crew missions. China is currently preparing to hurtle 12 astronauts into space and live in the space station. The team includes luminaries in the Chinese space program, women, and newcomers to space flight.
China previously sent two test modules in the last ten years to prepare for the permanent Heavenly Harmony space station. Its first module, Tiangong-1, scorched up after perilous orbit. The second, Tiangong-2, however, proved that the Chinese space program was on course after a successful run in 2018, BGR reports.
China's Thriving Space Program
China kickstarted a space program in the 1990s after it was barred from the International Space Station due to political conflict. Through the years, it has sent its first astronaut into space in its Shenzhou mission in 2003, starting a number of manned space missions that included an astronaut conducting a spacewalk.
The country also brought a crewless exploration of the Moon, with a rover exploring the far side of the Earth's satellite and taking home lunar rocks for analysis.
Heavenly Harmony's mission comes just weeks after another China space rover, the Zhurong, is set to land on Mars. It has been gathering data in its orbit on Mars since February and will explore the Red Planet's surface.
Other Chinese space exploration plans include touching down on an asteroid to collect soil samples, and a more grandiose Lunar mission in 2024, with astronauts landing on the Moon and bringing more lunar samples back to Earth. China also indicated it wanted to build a separate Lunar station and hurtle a space telescope into orbit, as reported by SpaceNews.
These latest Chinese efforts come after careful steps in advancing its space program. It had major setbacks, including the Chang Zeng 5 or Long March 5 rocket that failed due to an engine problem. The rocket is an earlier version of the current Long March 5B that will bring Heavenly Harmony modules into space.
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