Two of the three astronauts aboard China’s Tiangong (“Heavenly Palace”) space station completed a six-hour spacewalk on Friday without incident, according to China’s Manned Space Agency (CMSA).
The spacewalk was the first to be conducted during the current Shenzhou-14 mission, which began in June and is expected to last six months.
Astronauts Chen Dong and Liu Yang, both army pilots, returned to Tiangong Station shortly after midnight in China, according to the CMSA, which described the operation as a “total success”.
The space agency has released a video of the two Chinese astronauts in white space gear, with planet Earth on the horizon.
The astronauts installed a camera and a new robotic arm, and tested an emergency return procedure at the station.
Construction of the space station should be completed by the end of the year, with the arrival of a third and final module.
Tiangong will eventually have a T-shaped appearance and be similar in size to the former Russian station Mir (launched in 1986 by the former Soviet Union).
The infrastructure must last at least 10 years.
China is investing billions of euros in its space program. The Asian country sent the first astronaut into space in 2003.
In 2019, the country landed a device on the far side of the moon, a world first. In 2020, China brought samples from the moon and the following year landed a small robot on Mars.
Source: DN
