China Becomes the Third Spacefaring Nation

[willow_red]

At 7:00pm MDT last night, China became the third spacefaring nation when the Shenzhou 5 spacecraft launched with taikonaut Yang Liwei onboard. He is still up there now, making 14 orbits before landing somewhere in Inner Mongolia at around 4:00pm MDT today. Yuri Gagarin...Alan Shepard...Yang Liwei... This is the kind of history that hasn't been seen since the 1960s.

Full article:
http://space.com/missionlaunches/shenzhou5_launch_031014.html

Comments from Valentina Tereshkova (first woman in space):
http://www.space.com/missionlaunches/china_tereshkova_031014.html

Comments

Now if only they start going for the moon...

[nakano.livejournal.com]

It really would be nice if we got another space race out of this... China's stated goal is going to the moon, and doing so not just to tool around a bit but to start setting up shop and harvesting resources.... (after all, with a nation as big as china, they need all the resources they can get) That, more than anything else, seems likely to start a new space race. Supposedly they've got a chinese version of Mir ready to go up in another 4 years or so, and I have to say, its awfully nice to see a nation that actually supports its space program.

sigh. If only the US could get its act together...

-Nakano

Re: Now if only they start going for the moon...

[willow-red.livejournal.com]

Let me think...yes! I can only see more space programs as a good thing. China seems to be talking seriously about going to the Moon and maybe even establishing a base there. Unfortunately, history has shown that we tend to get more done in competition than cooperation, so maybe this will light a fire under the right people in the US government.

I've been reading NASA's Return to Flight plan. From what I can tell, it's the standard, "tell them what they want to hear so we can get back to business as usual." I just hope that they don't get away with that this time.