In recent moves to establish the country as a leader in space power, China has embarked on a six-month assignment, to work on the newest space station in the country. China has been recorded in history to be the third country to build a space station and put two astronauts in space, placing it after Russia and the United States.
China has placed into orbit, the first module of its Tiagong space station just last year, and the country intends to add more modules like the Mengtian science lab by year’s end. The Tiagong will have its electricity, propulsion, life support systems, and housing. It has been revealed that the country will be launching Xuntian, a space telescope by next year and the telescope will be flying close to the Tiagong and would be docking with the space station to refuel and for servicing.
There is a high ambition for the space station, Tiagong, and there are hopes that it would substitute the International Space Station (ISS), due to be decommissioned by 2031. The Chinese want to take samples from asteroids gravitating towards Earth a few years from now. And by the year 2030, the nation plans to already have its first astronauts on the Moon. That same year, it also plans to have collected samples from the planets, Jupiter and Mars, via probes.
The Chinese government had already placed its first satellite to orbit in the year 1970. Other countries that went into space at that time frame were the United States, The Soviet Union, France, and Japan.
