BEIJING (AFP) - Three Chinese astronauts on Monday entered an orbiting module for the first time, in a move broadcast live on China’s state television network and a key step towards the nation’s first space station.
The astronauts, two men and a woman, passed into the Tiangong-1 (“Heavenly Palace”) module a little under three hours after it docked with the Shenzhou-9 (“Divine Vessel”) spacecraft.
The Shenzhou-9 took off Saturday carrying the first Chinese woman to go into space, before undergoing the third automatic docking China has ever performed, and the first for a manned mission.
The astronauts, who were shown waving to a camera as they floated inside the narrow Tiangong-1 capsule, will attempt to complete the highly technical docking procedure manually later in their 13-day mission.