China's astronauts from left., Jing Haipeng, Liu Wang and Liu Yang, walk in front of a giant portrait of China's first astronaut Yang Liwei, as they depart for the Shenzhou 9 spacecraft rocket launch pad at the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center in Jiuquan, China, Saturday, June 16, 2012. China will send its first woman and two other astronauts into space Saturday to work on a temporary space station for about a week, in a key step toward becoming only the third nation to set up a permanent base in orbit.