Space Travel
12, Feb, 2012

Two Taikonauts Launched Into Space
Written by spacetravel.org   
Sunday, 16 October 2005 12:47
On Wednesday, 12 October 2005, two Chinese taikonauts, Fei Junlong and Nie Haisheng, were launched successfully into orbit. The taikonauts, both former fighter pilots, are on the Shenzhou VI spacecraft, which blasted off on a Long March 2F rocket from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Centre in north-west China at 0100 GMT. 21 minutes later, the Shenzhou VI entered orbit.

The flight is supposed to last almost five days. During the mission, the astronauts will leave the re-entry capsule and reside, sans their heavy spacesuits, in the 9-cubic-metre orbital module at the front of the spacecraft.

This is China’s second space expedition. The first was in October 2003, on the Shenzhou V. That mission was piloted by Yang Liwei, and lasted 21 hours.

China is the third country to send a human being into space, after the US and the former Soviet Union.

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