At 10:03 on November 12, the Tianzhou 5 cargo spacecraft set sail with full cargo and head-on. At 12:10, it successfully achieved rapid rending and docking with the Tianhe core module of the Chinese space station, and achieved 2-hour independent rapid rending and docking for the first time, setting a world record.
Personally, I thought of the rapid connection of "Tianzhou 5", but I still didn't expect it to be so fast!
Inadvertently, this is a new world record set by Chinese aerospace people. World records cannot be created just by wanting to create, especially in the aerospace field, which has extremely high requirements for technology and cannot tolerate any gaps. The new record set by Tianzhou 5 is that under the "small steps" of China's aerospace, step by step, and the development and accumulation of various technical levels have achieved today's "feat".
Tianzhou 5 launch
We might as well briefly review the launch situation from "Tianzhou 1" to "Tianzhou 5":
On April 20, 2017, Tianzhou 1 was launched at the Wenchang launch site in Hainan. This cargo spacecraft has enabled us to master the technologies of cargo transportation, propellant in orbit replenishment. The time it took for Tianzhou 1 to dock with the " Tiangong 2 " at that time was 7 days;
On May 29, 2021, the Tianzhou 2 was successfully launched, and it took about 8 hours to dock with Tianzhou and the core module;
On September 20, 2021, the Tianzhou 3 was launched. After Tianzhou 3 entered space, it successfully docked the Tianhe core module backward ports using the autonomous rapid rendezvous and docking mode, which lasted about 6.5 hours;
By May 10, 2022, Tianzhou 4 entered space, and it still used the autonomous rapid rendezvous and docking mode to successfully dock the Tianhe core module backward ports, which took about 7 hours.
, and it is today's Tianzhou 5.
Tianzhou 5 docking screen with the space station
This can clearly see that from Tianzhou 1 to 5, we have solidified and improved our technology bit by bit. You can see the mark of the Tianzhou series of spacecraft being improved over and over again.
At the same time, if you combine Tianzhou cargo spacecraft with Shenzhou spacecraft , it seems to be found that as the time for Tianzhou to dock with Tianhe core module is shortened, correspondingly, the time for Shenzhou to dock with the space station is also shortened. Perhaps, Tianzhou is providing technical guidance and verification for Shenzhou.
In the future, the Tianzhou cargo spacecraft will be launched approximately every six months in the next few years. The Tianzhou spacecraft may bring us more surprises.
China Space Station
If we look at it from a longer-term perspective, some of the technical characteristics of the Tianzhou spacecraft are likely to be "transferred" to the Shenzhou spacecraft. Therefore, it is worth looking forward to the creation of new docking time for the Shenzhou manned spacecraft - even if it does not create a world record, it can at least break its own record.
In addition, with the continuous maturity of Tianzhou technology, it is very likely to be transformed into a manned spacecraft based on Tianzhou spacecraft in the future. After all, the Shenzhou spacecraft can only carry three people at a time. If the Tianzhou is changed to a manned spacecraft, the one-time manned spacecraft can be doubled. This is also worth looking forward to.
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