Using a heavy Long March 5B rocket, China this morning at 06:23 Kiev time successfully launched the 22.5-ton main module of its future Tianhe station into a 370-kilometer intermediate orbit, which will serve as a dwelling, docking bay and laboratory.
China has approached the task in abundance: in addition to Tianhe (“Tianhe”), which is already in orbit, a copy of it, collected in case of an emergency launch from the Wenchang cosmodrome, remained on Earth.
The process of assembling the China Space Station (KS) of three modules will take about a year, it will take ten launches, not counting today. It will be placed at altitudes up to 450 km.
The ships Tianzhou (“Tianzhou”, cargo unmanned) and Shenzhou (“Shenzhou”, for crews) will be able to dock with the forward and nadir ports.
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To dock to the radial ports of the main module, two scientific bays Wentian and Mengtian (Wentian and Mentian, which will be launched in the first and second half of 2022) alternately dock to the frontal port on Tianhe: only there is rendezvous equipment. After that, the manipulator “manually” redirects them to the target side.
At the final stage of the formation of the space station, an autonomous module Xuntian will be launched into orbit next to it: it is equipped with a telescope.
Cargoes to the space station will be delivered by Tianzhou, which is tossed into space by the Chang Zheng 7A rocket. The first unmanned operational mission is scheduled for May, with a manned mission in June. Shenzhou-12 will deliver three taikonauts to the main module of the station.
The country will use the station for about 15 years as an astrophysical and biomedical laboratory, as well as for other tasks. Since, for geopolitical reasons, the PRC is prohibited from working on the International Space Station project, Beijing has to develop its own programs, which they consistently do there.
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