The astronauts landed 9 hours after they left the main module of China’s first space station, according to Reuters.
After their October launch aboard the Shenzhou-13 spacecraft, astronauts Zhai Zhigang and Wei Guangfu and astronaut Wang Yaping spent 183 days in space, completing the fifth of 11 missions needed to finish construction of China’s Tianhe space station by the end of the year.
Shenzhou-13 is the second of four manned missions to complete construction of the space station, which began last April.
Shenzhou 12 returned to Earth last September.
State media quoted the deputy director of technology for the manned spacecraft network, Shao Limin, as saying that China’s next two missions will be the “Tianzhou-4” spacecraft and the “Shenzhou-14” spacecraft.
It is worth noting that the United States prevented China from participating in the International Space Station.
China has spent the past decade developing technologies to build its own space station, the only one in the world other than the International Space Station.
China aims to become a space power by 2030, successfully launched probes to explore Mars and became the first country to land a spacecraft on the far side of the moon.
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