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Bringing dreams from the stars

By Hu Yinan (China Daily)
Updated: 2008-09-29 07:24

From right: Astronauts Liu Boming, Zhai Zhigang and Jing Haipeng salute after they return to Earth aboard the Shenzhou VII module in the grasslands of the Inner Mongolia autonomous region at 5:37 pm September 28, 2008. [Xinhua]

A man's life is unlike a winter's pine;

The ages and looks are not meant to ever last.

Just who can learn to fly in the heavens;

To absorb its essence and stay young?

No man has truly flown in the heavens and stayed forever young. But walk in outer space China did on Saturday, bringing it on par with the daring imagination of Li Bai (AD 701-762), China's most romantic poet.

And unlike the protagonists of Chinese mythology who would not return having stepped outside Earth, the Shenzhou VII crew all returned safe and sound at 5:37 pm yesterday afternoon with a solid touchdown in the Inner Mongolia autonomous region that was broadcast live on national television.

Premier Wen Jiabao welcomed them home from Beijing, saying at the ground control center that the mission's success was a milestone as China has become the third country to independently conduct a spacewalk.

"The motherland and the people will forever remember your historic contributions," Wen told the astronauts as the 68-hour mission came to an end.

Spaceship commander and spacewalker Zhai Zhigang told China Central Television shortly after he and his crew emerged from the re-entry capsule: "It was a glorious mission, full of challenges with a perfect ending. I feel proud of the motherland."

After landing, the astronauts sipped bottled water as they were given medical examinations inside the module. They were declared healthy.

Zhai, Liu Boming and Jing Haipeng stayed inside for about 46 minutes to adapt to the Earth's gravity before slowly crawling out of the narrow entrance.

The trio waved and sat on chairs outside the capsule. They were each presented with a bouquet of flowers.

The three heroic astronauts will have to wait until this morning before they can return to their homes. Before then, they were scheduled for a full night's rest in Hohhot, the capital of Inner Mongolia.

Zhai, a 42-year-old astronaut from Heilongjiang province, got his place in the history books with his 20-minute spacewalk on Saturday.

In a live broadcast bound to be included in every documentary on China thereafter, the former fighter pilot and two-time Shenzhou reserve slowly emerged from the orbital module at 4:41 pm on Saturday.

He did so while holding a Chinese flag, as China joined the US and Russia as the only nations to have ever completed a spacewalk.

"Greetings to the Chinese people and the people of the world," Zhai said as he climbed out of Shenzhou VII. Liu stayed inside the orbital module to assist him while Jing monitored the operation from the re-entry capsule.

President Hu Jintao watched the spacewalk from the Beijing center with a number of other State leaders.

Shortly afterward, Hu told the astronauts in a televised telephone exchange: "Your success represents a breakthrough in our manned space program the motherland and the people thank you."

While successful, the spacewalk was not without its anxious moments.

Zhai appeared to struggle with the hatch and a fire alarm was triggered in the orbiter as he began the spacewalk.

Wang Zhaoyao, the spokesman for the mission, conceded that the combined effects of weightlessness and depressurization on the hatch-opening operation had not been fully anticipated. He blamed a faulty sensor for the fire alarm.

The spacewalk required astronauts to first depressurize and then repressurize the orbital module and proved the effectiveness of Zhai's "feitian" home-made spacesuit that costs $4.4 million. The Chinese characters on the spacesuit were a copy of President Hu's handwriting.

Liu wore a nearly identical Russian-made Orlan suit, according to media reports.

Following the spacewalk, the astronauts released a 40-kg satellite to circle the orbiter and send back images to mission control.

The three astronauts were cut off for around three minutes as their re-entry module entered the outer edge of the Earth's atmosphere.

About 50 km above the ground a parachute opened and floated them down to the flat, empty grassland where all China's earlier space missions have also landed.

The expensive spacesuit had to be left behind however, as it was too heavy and bulky to fit in the re-entry capsule, state television said.

The mission has paved the way for a Chinese space lab, to be completed in 2010. Media reports earlier cited Shenzhou VII spaceship chief designer Qi Faren as saying that the next three Shenzhou crafts will "enter space with launch intervals of less than a month of each other", but sources with the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center dismissed the claim.

Shenzhou VIII will lift off "in early 2009, only months from now", an inside source with the project's rocket system told China Daily. The launch of Shenzhou IX is also planned for next year.

The country's most open space mission yet - with hundreds of reporters and tourists at the scene - will be followed by the production of the next generation of Shenzhou spaceships to serve the independent space station China intends to build before 2020, project commanders have said.

Chinese involvement in the International Space Station, a joint effort of more than a dozen nations, has been refused by the US for security considerations.

The country launched its first manned mission, Shenzhou V, in 2003. That was followed by a two-man mission in 2005.

Xinhua and agencies contributed to the story