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Milestones in China's space efforts
Updated: 2005-10-18 10:19 September
1955:
Chinese-born Tsien Hsue-sen, an American-trained rocketry expert and
co-founder of NASA¡¯s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, leaves the U.S. for China after
five years of virtual house arrest amid accusations of communist sympathies. He
becomes the leader of China¡¯s rocketry program.
1956-58:
Soviets
provide intermediate-range ballistic missile to China for study.
1960:
China launches its first rocket despite a cutoff of Soviet aid.
1968:
Research center established to prepare for manned spaceflight
by 1973. Program later canceled due to lack of money and political support.
1970:
China becomes the fifth country to launch a satellite into
space, sending up the Dongfanghong-1 ("The East is Red") aboard a Long March
rocket.
1991:
Tsien retires.
1992:
Human spaceflight
program relaunched as "Project 921," with target date of October 1999. Qi Faren,
trained in Russia, named chief designer.
1995:
Russia agrees to
assist China with human spaceflight technology and training of Chinese
astronauts in cosmonaut academy near Moscow.
Nov. 20,
1999:
Successful test flight of the unmanned capsule Shenzhou 1, or "Divine
Vessel." Three further unmanned test flights follow.
Oct. 15,
2003:
Shenzhou 5 launches with one astronaut, making China the third nation
capable of putting a human in space on its own, after Soviets and the U.S.
Oct. 12, 2005:
Shenzhou 6 launches with two astronauts, on a
multi-day mission aimed at leaving an orbiting module in space.
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