Yang Liwei and Shenzhou 5 (2003): China's First Astronaut

Shenzhou 5 was China’s first crewed spaceflight. On 15 October 2003, People’s Liberation Army Air Force pilot Yang Liwei was launched from the Gobi Desert, circled the Earth 14 times and landed safely the next morning. The flight made China the third country, after the Soviet Union and the United States, to put a human into orbit with its own rocket and spacecraft.

Background: Project 921

China had considered human spaceflight as early as the 1970s, but the programme was shelved for economic reasons. A project to build a two-person capsule called Shuguang, with a group of military pilots chosen as trainees in 1971, was abandoned in the early 1970s amid the turmoil of the Cultural Revolution. In September 1992 the government approved a new crewed spaceflight effort known as Project 921. Its long-term plan had three steps: crewed flights, then spacewalks and docking, and finally a space station.

Engineers designed the Shenzhou spacecraft, with an orbital module, a re-entry capsule for the crew and a service module carrying engines and solar panels. The general layout resembled the Soviet Soyuz, and China bought Russian training help and hardware during the 1990s, but the spacecraft was larger and built in China. Wang Yongzhi served as the programme’s first chief designer.

Four uncrewed test flights, Shenzhou 1 to Shenzhou 4, took place between November 1999 and January 2003. They tested the Long March 2F rocket, the escape system, life support and recovery. The Long March 2F was adapted from earlier Chinese launchers specially for crewed flight, with an escape tower on top to pull the capsule clear of a failing rocket. The Shenzhou spacecraft weighed roughly 7,800 kilograms, heavier than the Soyuz.

The astronaut

Yang Liwei was born in June 1965 in Suizhong County, Liaoning province. He became a military pilot and was selected in 1998 as one of 14 men in China’s first group of astronaut trainees, two of whom were former instructors trained in Russia.

The final choice for the first flight was kept secret until shortly before launch. Yang was reported to have been picked from a shortlist of three for his performance in training and his calm temperament.

The flight

Shenzhou 5 lifted off on a Long March 2F rocket from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center at 9:00 a.m. Beijing time on 15 October 2003. The launch was not broadcast live, although state media reported it within minutes.

Yang later described a period of intense vibration during the ascent, caused by resonance between the rocket and the spacecraft, which he found very hard to endure; engineers modified the rocket for later flights. In orbit he ate, rested, made reports to the ground and displayed the national flag of China and the flag of the United Nations to the cameras.

After 14 orbits the re-entry capsule separated and returned under a parachute, landing in the grasslands of central Inner Mongolia at about 6:23 a.m. on 16 October. Yang climbed out unaided. The orbital module stayed in space and carried on with experiments for several months.

By the numbers

Consequences

The flight was celebrated across China as a symbol of national achievement and was widely reported abroad as the start of a new era in which space was no longer dominated by two powers. Yang Liwei became a national hero. In November 2003 he was given the honorary title of “Space Hero”, and he later took senior posts in China’s crewed space programme, including deputy director of the China Manned Space Engineering Office. Governments and space agencies in many countries, including the United States and Russia, congratulated China on the flight.

Shenzhou 6, with two astronauts, followed in October 2005, and Shenzhou 7 carried out China’s first spacewalk in September 2008. The Tiangong-1 laboratory, launched in 2011, tested docking, and from 2021 China assembled its own permanent Tiangong space station, separate from the International Space Station.

Timeline

• 1992, September: The Chinese government approves the crewed spaceflight programme, Project 921.
• 1998: China selects its first group of 14 astronaut trainees, including Yang Liwei.
• 1999, 20 November: The uncrewed Shenzhou 1 makes the first test flight.
• 2002, 30 December: Shenzhou 4, the last uncrewed test flight, is launched.
• 2003, 15 October: Yang Liwei is launched on Shenzhou 5 from Jiuquan.
• 2003, 16 October: The capsule lands in Inner Mongolia after 14 orbits.
• 2005, 12 October: Shenzhou 6 carries two astronauts into orbit.
• 2008, 27 September: Zhai Zhigang makes China’s first spacewalk during Shenzhou 7.

Why it matters

Shenzhou 5 came 42 years after Yuri Gagarin’s flight, and it ended the Soviet-American monopoly on independent human spaceflight. It launched a steady, step-by-step programme that has since given China its own space station and ambitions for crewed lunar missions.