Historic small steps for taikonauts

Sunday was an important day in space for China. At 14:57, taikonauts Liu Boming and Tang Hongbo returned to their module Tianhe, or Harmony of the Heavens, after laboring for seven hours in space.

Although taikonaut Zhai Zhigang from the three-day Shenzhou VII mission left the first Chinese footstep in space in 2008, a space walk by taikonauts was still in an experimental stage. Therefore, what looks like a small step by the taikonauts, is actually no less than a giant leap for China’s aerospace industry.

Such out-of-capsule space-wandering by taikonauts will be necessary for future space missions because there are many jobs requiring human action, such as for installing a telescope on the space station’s surface, for maintaining surface cleanliness, and many others.

At the International Space Station, the different modules can only be connected through externally hanging pipelines because of the sheer size. In the non-airtight zones of the station there are batteries, gas cylinders and experimental equipment. The maintenance of all these requires taikonauts to step out of their modules and walk in space.

There are two main technologies making this mission possible, the first of which is the mechanical arm helping taikonauts to step out of their module and reach wherever they need to without relying on the complicated and risky jet-propelling devices. The taikonauts’ ability to walk in space surely reflects a giant progress in China’s mechanical arm technology.

The other technology aiding their movement is the new-generation space suit that protects the taikonauts from the varying temperatures — 150 C on the sun-lit side to minus 100 C on the shadow side. In the absence of the protective ozone layer in space, the suit also protects them from the strong ultraviolet rays.

The success of the first space walk by taikonauts shows China has made technological progress in all these aspects. More breakthroughs could follow thanks to the efforts of Chinese scientists, promising a bright future for the Chinese space industry.