China's astronauts ready for longer missions

[Waspie_Dwarf]

China's astronauts ready for longer missions

BEIJING, July 12 (Xinhuanet) -- Chinese astronauts are capable of conducting medium and long-term space missions and enduring the harsh physical conditions involved, a senior astronaut said on Thursday.

"From Shenzhou V to Shenzhou X, we have been laying the foundation for future medium and long-term missions," said Nie Haisheng, one of three astronauts who took part in last month's 15-day space mission, the longest yet for China.

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[pallidin]

Go China!

Might as well with the wealth you've obtained through large-scale inhumane labor practices and shipping time-limited, inferior products around the world.

I bought a chinese product, a solar yard lamp, that went dead after a couple months.

I opened it up, and to the shock of both myself and my wife, there was a circuit connection that was NOT soldered, but "held" by glue, that melted in the summer heat and broke the connection. That was OBVIOUSLY done on purpose, in my opinion.

From that( it was a couple years ago), we try to avoid Chinese products as much as possible.

This does not include reputable international companies based in China, of course.

Anyway, sorry for my rant, but it just ticks me-off that their space program is directly augmented by funds that would be illegal in the U.S.

[skookum]

5 manned missions and we have reports of intended space stations and moon bases.

I wonder how many failures they have had which like in the old USSR style will never be published.

I think China has a huge amount to contribute to space exploration but they are where NASA and USSR were in the 60's

[Waspie_Dwarf]

5 manned missions and we have reports of intended space stations and moon bases.

Space stations yes, but apart from talking hypothetically about possible future goals, the Chinese have announced no plans for moon bases.

I wonder how many failures they have had which like in the old USSR style will never be published.

Exactly the same number of failed manned missions as the Soviet Union managed to hide... none at all. You couldn't hide such a failure in the sixties and you certainly couldn't do so now. Besides which the Chinese have always announced an impending launch BEFORE it occurs.

I think China has a huge amount to contribute to space exploration but they are where NASA and USSR were in the 60's

No, they are ahead of that. Remember in just 5 flights they have progressed to 3 crew members docking to a space lab. They have developed space suits and been on spacewalks. The Shenzhou may be based on Soyuz but it is larger and more sophisticated, making it the most advanced manned spacecraft currently in use.

Tiangong-2 will have 2 docking ports allowing it be visited by unmanned freighter vehicles, something the USSR didn't have until Salyut 6 in 1977 and the USA didn't have until the ISS.

The only thing, technologically speaking, preventing the Chinese having a Mir class space station now is that the heavy lift launch vehicle needed to launch the station modules is still under development.

[skookum]

When China have a failure I very much doubt the rest of the world will hear about it.

A bit like when the USSR virtually killed the first man in orbit, and it was not Yuri Gagarin.

[shrooma]

the USSR virtually killed the first man in orbit, and it was not Yuri Gagarin.

.

Vladimir Ilyushin...?

[Waspie_Dwarf]

When China have a failure I very much doubt the rest of the world will hear about it.

Only someone that doesn't have a clue what they are talking about would make such a foolish statement. The Soviet Union denied for years that they had tried to beat America to the Moon, but every single failure of the N1 rocket was known about in the west. There are these things, you may not have heard of them, called spy satellites. There are also civilian earth resources satellites which will clearly show a launcher on the pad. China simply could not hide a launch failure. Plus, and I hope you will read this slowly this time, China always announces it's manned flights BEFORE they are launched.

Add to that the fact that China have had failures (but not with the manned programme) and the world does know about them and your argument is clearly fallacious.

But hey, why let inconvenient things like facts and logic get in the way?

A bit like when the USSR virtually killed the first man in orbit, and it was not Yuri Gagarin.

I notice you presented no evidence to back this up. What's more you won't be able to as there is none. You see there are two schools of thought on this, those that believe it and those that aren't totally clueless on the subject.

There was no previous manned launch to Gagarin. There is no evidence to support this moronic conspiracy theory. No launch was announced (Soviet practice ON ALL MANNED FLIGHTS was to announce the launch once the vehicle reached orbit and before it landed). No such launch was tracked by the US or the teams of satellite spotting amateurs around the world.

Even the press stories that lead to this stupid story couldn't agree on when this flight was supposed to have taken place, some claiming it was in March 1961, others on April 7th (which would mean that the Soviets would have managed to launch a second flight just 7 days after the failed flight, impressive but highly unlikely).

The Soviet Union made public their two fatal Soyuz crashes (they had to they were tracked by amateurs as well as the US military). They made public their two non-fatal Soyuz accidents.

A large rocket of the Vostok class could not be launched with out US radar detecting it, even in 1961. No such launch took place.

Vladimir Ilyushin...?

The Soviet Union was secretive about it's cosmonauts, never announcing their identities until after they had reached orbit, however the identities and fates of the original 20 cosmonauts are now known. There was no cosmonaut before Gagarin. Vladimir Ilyushin was never part of the cosmonaut corps.