After spending five months in orbit at the nation’s space station, three Chinese astronauts made a safe return to Earth on Tuesday, according to state media.
At 8:11 am (0011 GMT), Jing Haipeng, Zhu Yangzhu, and Gui Haichao landed at China’s Dongfeng landing site, as reported by state media CCTV.
There was footage of their return capsule hitting the ground and creating an orange dust cloud before parachuting into the desolate Gobi Desert.
“On-site medical supervision and insurance personnel confirmed that the astronauts… are in good health,” CCTV said.
“The Shenzhou-16 crewed flight mission was a complete success.”
Jing, Zhu and Gui travelled to China’s Tiangong space station in late May and were in orbit for 154 days.
During that period, they conducted a spacewalk that lasted over eight hours and conducted scientific experiments.
Last week, when the Shenzhou-17 mission took off from the Jiuquan launch site in the northwest of the country, a new crew took their place.
The nation’s Manned Space Agency states that Tang Hongbo, Tang Shengjie, and Jiang Xinlin will conduct “space science and application payload tests”.
In addition, they will perform maintenance and repair minor space debris damage to the station.
Since taking over as president ten years ago, Beijing has expedited its plans to become a significant space power.
The world’s second-largest economy has invested billions of dollars in its military-run space programme to catch up with the United States and Russia.
China also aims to send a crewed mission to the Moon by 2030 and eventually build a base on the lunar surface.
