Tiangong-1
Chinese prototype space station in orbit from 2011 to 2018 / From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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Tiangong-1 (Chinese: 天宫一号; pinyin: Tiāngōng yīhào; lit. 'Heaven's Palace-1" or "Celestial Palace-1"') was China's first prototype space station.[9] It orbited Earth from September 2011 to April 2018, serving as both a crewed laboratory and an experimental testbed to demonstrate orbital rendezvous and docking capabilities during its two years of active operational life.[10][11]
Station statistics | |
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COSPAR ID | 2011-053A |
SATCAT no. | 37820 |
Launch | 29 September 2011, 13:16:03.507 UTC[1][2] |
Carrier rocket | Long March 2F/G |
Launch pad | Jiuquan, LA-4/SLS-1 |
Reentry | 2 April 2018, 00:16 UTC [3][4]
2 April 2018 00:15 UTC (China Manned Space Engineering Office)[5] |
Mission status | Deorbited [4] |
Mass | 8,506 kg (18,753 lb)[6] |
Length | 10.4 m (34 ft) |
Diameter | 3.35 m (11.0 ft) |
Pressurised volume | 15 m3 (530 cu ft) [7] |
Days occupied | 20 days, 18.5 hours (Hatch open to hatch closed)[8] |
Tiangong-1 | |||||||||||||||||||||||
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Simplified Chinese | 天宫一号 | ||||||||||||||||||||||
Traditional Chinese | 天宮一號 | ||||||||||||||||||||||
Literal meaning | Celestial Palace-1 or Heavenly Palace-1 | ||||||||||||||||||||||
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Target Vehicle | |||||||||||||||||||||||
Simplified Chinese | 目标飞行器 | ||||||||||||||||||||||
Traditional Chinese | 目標飛行器 | ||||||||||||||||||||||
Literal meaning | Target Vehicle | ||||||||||||||||||||||
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Launched uncrewed aboard a Long March 2F launch vehicle on 29 September 2011,[1][12] it was the first operational component of the Tiangong program, which launched a larger, modular station into orbit in 2021.[10][13] Tiangong-1 was initially projected to be deorbited in 2013,[14] to be replaced over the following decade by the larger Tiangong-2 and Tiangong-3 space stations,[15] but it orbited until 2 April 2018.[3][4][5][16][17]
Tiangong-1 was visited by a series of Shenzhou spacecraft during its two-year operational lifetime. The first of these, the uncrewed Shenzhou 8, successfully docked with the module in November 2011,[18][19] while the crewed Shenzhou 9 mission docked in June 2012.[20][21][22] A third and final mission to Tiangong-1, the crewed Shenzhou 10, docked in June 2013.[23][24][25] The crewed missions to Tiangong-1 were notable for including China's first female astronauts, Liu Yang and Wang Yaping.[24][26]
On 21 March 2016, after a lifespan extended by two years, the China Manned Space Engineering Office announced that Tiangong-1 had officially ended its service.[27][28] They went on to state that the telemetry link with Tiangong-1 had been lost.[29] A couple of months later, amateur satellite trackers watching Tiangong-1 found that China's space agency had lost control of the station.[29] In September 2016, after conceding they had lost control over the station, officials speculated that the station would re-enter and burn up in the atmosphere late in 2017.[30][31] According to the China Manned Space Engineering Office, Tiangong-1 started reentry over the southern Pacific Ocean, northwest of Tahiti, on 2 April 2018 at 00:16 UTC.[4][5][16][17]