By Leonard David
Senior Space Writer
posted: 07:00 am ET
02 January 2003
China's unpiloted Shenzhou 4 continues to circle the Earth with the craft's reentry module likely to touch down on terra firma this coming weekend.
Laden with experiments and housing a set of instrumented mannequins, the spaceship is fully-equipped with the gear and resources needed to support future Chinese space flyers.
Boosted into orbit atop a Long March 2F rocket early Monday on December 30 (Beijing Time), Shenzhou 4 has begun maneuvering in space and is expected to finish a major aspect of its shakeout mission this Sunday.
If all goes as planned, the spacecraft would appear ready for prime time piloting by a two or three-person crew later this year.
China's step-by-step Shenzhou track record shows flight tests of the vehicle have picked up speed. The first in the series flew in November 1999, with Shenzhou missions in January 2001 and March 2002, followed now by the Shenzhou 4 test shot in December 2002, some nine months later.
New features
China's entrée into human space travel seems close at hand.
Shortly after the Shenzhou (meaning "divine vessel") sailed into orbit, China's top space authorities heralded the flight as setting the stage for sending Chinese astronauts skyward. According to media outlets in the country, Chinese astronauts received a week's worth of training in the spacecraft prior to its sendoff into space.
Qi Faren, leading designer of the spacecraft system, was quoted as saying that the currently flying craft is more comfortable for crews than previously orbited Shenzhou spaceships. Even personal items, like a sleeping bag, food and medicines are also onboard.
According to a report in the People's Daily, Shenzhou 4 features manual control, emergency landing, and other systems to ensure astronaut safety. Windows of the return part of the vehicle are fabricated to retain see-through status despite a blistering reentry so that crews on future missions can monitor parachute deployment and their touchdown whereabouts.
Confidence building
Along with ground stations, four ocean-going ships are anchored in Pacific, Indian and Atlantic waters. They are heavily geared to monitor and control Shenzhou 4 as it circles Earth. Both land and sea landing rescue zones have been established, all as prelude to China's entry into human spaceflight.
Like the last two Shenzhou missions, Shenzhou 4 is expected to detach a maneuverable orbital module that stays in space for months of follow-on flight. Powered by its own solar panels, this section is loaded with additional science and technology experiments.
China space watcher, Phillip Clark of Molniya Space Consultancy in the United Kingdom, said Shenzhou 4 has initially boosted itself into a 206-mile by 209-mile (331-kilometer by 337-kilometer) orbit. That altitude was also flown by the last two Shenzhou ships and seems destined to be the operating orbit for a piloted crew, he predicted.
Clark said a piloted Shenzhou craft would likely stay in Earth orbit for 7 days.
If true, and including expected orbital maneuvers of the vehicle, China's first piloted spaceship would thus be "far more ambitious" than maiden voyages in America's Mercury or the former Soviet Union's Vostok human spaceflight programs, Clark said.
As China's confidence in human space travel grows, the docking of two Shenzhou vehicles -- launched in quick succession -- to create a mini-space laboratory is conceivable, Clark noted. |
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