Chinese space station in low Earth orbit From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The Tiangong space station is a space station in Low Earth orbit.[1] The space station belongs to China's space program. As of 2024, the space station has astronauts.
Distance from Earth: "Tiangong orbits Earth at an altitude of around" ... "340 to 450 kilometers", according to media (2023).[2]
It is the third station by China, after Tiangong-1 and Tiangong-2.
Tiangong means sky palace.
The main parts of the station are shown in the diagram below.
Solar array | Solar array | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Solar array | Solar array | Docking port | Solar array | Solar array | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Wentian laboratory | Tianhe service module | Mengtian laboratory | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Solar array | EVA hatch | Docking port | Docking port | Solar array | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
China plans to do a number of experiments on the station.[4] Other nations will also use the space station. These include Italy which has made a long-term agreement with China to work together on spaceflight.[5][6] The University of Oslo in Norway is going to use the station for cancer research.[7]
As late as 2024, there have been spaceflights to and from the space station.
Launch date | Spacecraft | Launch vehicle | Launch pad | Launched by | Where it docked at the station |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
28 April 2021[8] | Tianhe | Long March 5B | Wenchang LC-1[9] | CASC | N/A |
All dates are UTC and may change.
Launch date (NET) | Spacecraft | Launch vehicle | Launch pad | Launching by | Where it will dock at the station |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
20 May 2021[10] | Tianzhou 2 | Long March 7 | Wenchang LC-2 | CASC | Tianhe aft |
10 June 2021[11] | Shenzhou 12 | Long March 2F | Jiuquan SLS-1 | CASC | Tianhe forward |
September 2021[12] | Tianzhou 3 | Long March 7 | Wenchang LC-2 | CASC | Tianhe aft |
October 2021[13] | Shenzhou 13 | Long March 2F | Jiuquan SLS-1 | CASC | Tianhe forward |
March–April 2022[14] | Tianzhou 4 | Long March 7 | Wenchang LC-2 | CASC | Tianhe aft |
May 2022[15] | Shenzhou 14 | Long March 2F | Jiuquan SLS-1 | CASC | Tianhe forward |
May–June 2022[16] | Wentian | Long March 5B | Wenchang LC-1 | CASC | Tianhe |
August–September 2022[17] | Mengtian | Long March 5B | Wenchang LC-1 | CASC | Tianhe |
October 2022[18] | Tianzhou 5 | Long March 7 | Wenchang LC-2 | CASC | Tianhe aft |
November 2022[19] | Shenzhou 15 | Long March 2F | Jiuquan SLS-1 | CASC | Tianhe |
It will be made up of several modules (parts) that need to be put together in space. The first module is called Tianhe.[20] It was launched on 28 April 2021.[8] It will take about 11 total launches to build the station.[7]
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