The spacecraft re-entered Earth's atmosphere and touched down shortly after 10 a.m. in China's northwestern Inner Mongolia, with its three-person crew, including female astronaut Liu Yang.
China has launched its latest manned area mission – whose crew includes its 1st woman astronaut, Liu Yang.
The Shenzhou 9 capsule rode to orbit atop an extended March rocket from the Jiuquan spaceport on the sting of the Gobi desert.
Ms Liu and her 2 male colleagues are heading to the Tiangong area lab.
They will pay over per week living and dealing on the 335km-high vessel, testing new systems and conducting variety of scientific experiments.
Before leaving, the crew were presented to Communist Party officers, VIPs and therefore the media.
Born in Henan province and an solely kid
Married, but has no kids of her own
Air force pilot with rank of major
A Communist Party member
Honoured as a “model” pilot in March 2010
Landed a plane safely when it absolutely was struck by eighteen pigeons
Goes by “little flying knight” on the QQ instant messaging service
Has been described as having a penchant for patriotic speeches
Profile: China’s 1st spacewoman
“We can obey orders, hear directions and be calm; and co-ordinate along to successfully complete China’s 1st manned rendezvous and docking mission,” said Commander Jing Haipeng.
China’s prime legislator, Wu Bangguo, wanted them well and told them: “We predict your safe come back.”
The Shenzhou-9 spacecraft lifted off on schedule at 18:37 local time (10:37 GMT; 11:37 BST).
All systems gave the impression to operate normally and eight minutes later, the spacecraft had entered orbit. terribly shortly when Shenzhou-9 had unfurled its solar panels.
It will take one or two of days to succeed in Tiangong. A docking is planned for Monday at 15:00 Beijing time (07:00 GMT; 08:00 BST).
Mr Jing, 46, is creating his second spaceflight when taking part within the Shenzhou-7 outing in 2008 – the mission that included China’s 1st spacewalk.
His flight engineers are each first-timers, however.
Liu Wang, 42, a People’s Liberation Army fighter pilot, has his likelihood when spending fourteen years within the China National area Administration’s astronaut corps.
Thirty-three-year-old Liu Yang, conjointly a fighter pilot, has on the opposite hand emerged as China’s 1st lady astronaut when simply 2 years of coaching.
Her role within the mission are going to be to run the medical experiments in orbit.
Shenzhou-9 follows on from the unmanned Shenzhou-8 venture last year that tested the technologies needed to affix a capsule to the Tiangong lab.
Those manoeuvres went well and gave Chinese officers the arrogance to send up humans.
When it arrives at Tiangong, the Shenzhou-9 craft is anticipated to form a totally automated docking, however there’s an idea to undertake a manual docking later within the mission.
This would see the crew uncouple their vehicle from the lab, come back to an outlined distance and then command their ship to re-attach itself.
Liu Wang can take the lead during this activity. “We’ve done several simulations,” he said throughout the pre-launch press conference.
“We’ve mastered the techniques and skills. China has top quality technologies and astronauts, and so i am assured we’ll fulfil the manual rendezvous.”
Liu Wang (L), Jing Haipeng (C) and Liu Yang compose the crew of Shenzhou-9
Tiangong is that the next step during a strategy that Beijing authorities hope can lead ultimately to the development and operation of an oversized, permanently manned area station.
It is just the prototype for the modules China expects to make and take part orbit. Mastering the rendezvous and docking procedures is central to the present strategy.
