China's Space Station

Creag

Creag

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China will begin constructing its space station in 2021
The Chinese space agency is building a brand new space station, and they’re going about it in a suitably impressive way: an ambitious schedule of 11 planned launches crammed into only two years. When it’s done, the 66-ton space station will host crews of three astronauts for up to six months at a time, lasting for a planned 10 years before de-orbiting.

The new station, slated to open for spacey business in 2023, will feature three modules: a main living space and two modules designed to host experiments from collaborators around the world investigating everything from space technologies to zero-gee biology.

The first module should go up – if everything goes as planned – in the first quarter of 2022 onboard the heavy-lift Long March 5B rocket, which made a controversial debut recently when its main stage rocket fell back in pieces scattered across the eastern Atlantic (and bits of Africa) in a haphazard way shortly after launch. The remaining launches will place the experimental modules, as well as supplies and some folks to run the place.

Speaking of folks to run the place, the Chinese space agency announced plans to select their latest batch of astronauts this July. According to recent statements, the selection will for the first time include civilians with science and engineering backgrounds, not just military personnel from the People’s Liberation Army Air Force.

In addition to the cool new space station, the Chinese are also planning to launch a cool new telescope, dubbed “Xuntian”. It will have the same size mirror as the Hubble Space Telescope, but be able to image a much wider field of view on the sky. The new telescope will share the same orbit as the space station (an altitude of 340-450 kilometers with an orbital inclination of 43 degrees), allowing the telescope to dock with the station for repairs and upgrades.
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www.universetoday.com

China will begin constructing its space station in 2021

www.universetoday.com www.universetoday.com
 
grok said:
Hope they use one of their colonies for launches, table mountain isn't flat for nothing..
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Alternatively they could build the mother of seaside military bases on it.... or just plant monster cannons or something.
 
Cool thing is if they put a space station in space there will be less free space in space.
 
Fulcrum29 said:
Space station, meh, Xuntian, awe.

To be honest it will be good to have another space station up there.
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I am a little puzzled that there is just a ten plan for this - or have I read this wrong?
 
McT said:
I am a little puzzled that there is just a ten plan for this - or have I read this wrong?
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Logistically, I am the wrong person to puzzle on space missions, but, yes, you read it right,

www.space.com

China wants to build a new space station. A planned launch in April will set the stage.

In April, China is planning a launch that will help the country prepare for flights to construct a new space station.
www.space.com www.space.com

China plans to finish the space station by 2022, after more than 10 missions for construction and in-orbit assembly. The station will be shaped like a T, with a core module, called Tianhe, at the center and one lab capsule on either side of that.

All told, the station will offer up to 5,650 cubic feet (160 cubic meters) of living space across the three modules. That's a little more than one-third of the space on the International Space Station, which has 13,696 cubic feet (388 cubic meters) of room, not including temporary expansions from visiting spaceships.
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11 planned launches... it may end up being more, but China still needs to remedy, or minimise, their waste situation. I would say it is an evolving plan.
 
Brawler said:
Anyone watching Space Force on netflix?
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I watched the whole 1st series.
It's got fun moments and a bit of drama in between.
It mixed serious and humour too much IMHO.
I did enjoy it however.
 
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