Posted: Sun, Apr 27, 2025, 10:25 AM ET (1425 GMT)

Three Chinese astronauts arrived at the Tiangong space station Thursday. The Shenzhou-20 spacecraft docked with Tiangong at around 11:49 am EDT (1549 GMT), six and a half hours after its launch from Jiuquan, China. The spacecraft carried commander Chen Dong and crewmates Chen Zhongrui and Wang Jie, who will soon take over control of Tiangong in the coming days from the incumbent Shenzhou-19 crew. The six-month-long Shenzhou-20 mission will include a number of extravehicular activities, science and application experiments, outreach activities and more. It will also receive the Tianzhou-9 cargo spacecraft.