Chinese astronauts still stuck in orbit after space junk hits their ride home

Chinese authorities have said they are working to bring back the three astronauts whose return from the Tiangong space station was delayed after debris struck their return spacecraft.

The China Manned Space Engineering Office (CMSE) said it was making return plans for the stranded crew “in an orderly and steady manner,” and putting safety considerations first.

The three astronauts, or taikonauts in Mandarin, left Earth for the Chinese space station on a Shenzhou-20 mission in April and were scheduled to return home on November 5th.

However, their return was postponed after space junk hit their return spacecraft, resulting in an extension to their six-month mission.

After the return mission of the Shenzhou-20 was postponed, “emergency response plans and measures were immediately activated following the principle of ‘life above all, safety first,’” the CMSE said in a statement.

The agency did not specify what the plans were, but said a “comprehensive rehearsal” of the return mission is underway and the three astronauts – Chen Dong, Chen Zhongrui, and Wang Jie – are carrying on with their work as usual.

The crew is on the space station with three other astronauts who joined them on the Shenzhou-21 mission that left Earth on October 31st.

“At present, the space station complex is operating normally and is capable of supporting two astronaut crews simultaneously in orbit,” the CMSE said.

It added: “The Shenzhou-20 crew are in good condition, living and working normally, and are jointly conducting on-orbit scientific experiments with the Shenzhou-21 crew.”

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Meanwhile, sources familiar with the matter told the South China Morning Post that Shenzhou-22, originally built for the next crew rotation, was being prepared and stocked at the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Centre in the Gobi Desert.

It will bring fresh supplies to the space station and return the crew to Earth. It’s unclear when the rescue mission will be carried out.

The damage inflicted by debris on Shenzhou-20 wasn’t considered serious, but the team decided to “play it safe,” one of the sources told the South China Morning Post. The spacecraft will return to Earth without its crew, they added.

It’s reportedly the first time since 2003, when China began its crewed space program, that a mission has had to make an unexpected schedule change while in orbit.

In March, NASA astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams returned to Earth on a SpaceX capsule, nine months after their faulty Boeing Starliner craft upended what was to be a week-long stay on the International Space Station (ISS).

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