Manned Spacecraft

Meet Liu Yang: China's first female astronaut in space

Female astronaut Liu Yang, 33, and two male crew members — mission commander Jing Haipeng, 45, and newcomer Liu Wang, 43 — are to dock the spacecraft with a prototype space lab in a key step toward building a permanent space station.

China all set to flag off most ambitious space mission

China will launch three astronauts, including a mother of one who flies transport planes, to live and work on a space station for about a week, a major step in its goal of becoming only the third nation with a permanent base orbiting Earth.