China sent three tyconauts on its space platform

BEIJING (Reuters) – Three Chinese astronauts took off on Tuesday aboard the Shenzhou-16 (celestial vessel) to climb to the Chinese space platform and relay a team of three other taikonauts there.

The spacecraft and its three passengers left Earth at 01:31 GMT, launched by a Long March 2F rocket from the Jiuquan launch pad in the Gobi Desert.

They will be installed on the Chinese Space Station (CSS), a platform made up of three modules whose assembly was completed in late 2022.

The crew consists of Jing Haipeng, 56, a veteran of the Chinese Air Force who has already made three trips into space.

He took off with 36-year-old Zhu Yangzhu and Gui Haichao.

The first will assume the role of on-board engineer while the second, an academic, will be responsible for conducting and supervising scientific experiments on the station.

(Liz Li and Qiaoyi Li; with Liangping Gao and Ethan Wang; French edition by Nicolas Delme, editing by Blandine Heinault)