Hong Kong: According to China’s national space agency, astronaut Wang Yaping scripted history on Sunday becoming the country’s first woman to do a spacewalk.
According to the China Manned Space Agency, Wang and colleague astronaut Zhai Zhigang, two of the three-member team now at China’s new Tiangong space station, successfully completed the 6.5-hour spacewalk in the early hours of Monday morning.
Ye Guangfu, the third member of the Shenzhou-13 crew, stayed on the space station to assist with the spacewalk from the core module. The team built a suspension mechanism and transferred connectors to the station’s robotic arm during the spacewalk. They also put the safety of supporting equipment to the test, including China’s own spacesuit.
Since their arrival on October 16, this is the first time the crew has left the station. Wang waved to viewers on Earth shortly after stepping out of the space station’s cabin on Sunday, saying she felt incredible in a video posted by the flight control centre that has since gone popular on Chinese social media. She said, “When I looked out of the window for the first time, I realized the true meaning of the power of life… that kind of beauty was just beyond comprehension.” After Liu Yang made history by joining the Shenzhou-9 spacecraft in 2012, Wang is China’s second woman in space.