BEIJING: Three Chinese astronauts returned to Earth on Friday after spending nearly seven months in space and completing the handover with another crew earlier this week.
The craft carrying Zhang Lu, Wu Fei and Zhang Hongzhang of the Shenzhou 21 crew touched down at the Dongfeng landing site in north China’s Inner Mongolia region in the evening. Their return came as China prepares for its first lunar landing by 2030.
The crew had completed various tasks, from processing and transmitting experimental data to transferring remaining supplies, the official Xinhua News Agency quoted the China Manned Space Agency as saying. They also shared their experience with the Shenzhou 23 crew who arrived at the space station on Monday, Xinhua said.
Xinhua reported earlier that the crew had completed three spacewalk activities. Zhang Jingbo, the space agency’s spokesperson, said that Zhang Lu, who was also on an earlier Shenzhou 15 mission to the space station, had completed seven such operations in total — becoming the Chinese astronaut with the most spacewalks, the report added.
One of the three astronauts who arrived at the Tiangong space station with the Shenzhou 23 craft is set to stay for a year. Tiangong means “Heavenly Palace” in Chinese.
