Shenzhou-20 crew rides Shenzhou-21 home after debris strike

The Shenzhou-20 astronauts have returned to Earth on the Shenzhou-21 spacecraft after engineers deemed the Shenzhou-20 vehicle unsafe following a debris strike while it was docked to the Tiangong space station. The debris struck the viewport window of the Shenzhou-20 capsule, where tiny cracks were observed, according to the …

[Anonymous Coward]

Ding ding.

The 20 was withdrawn from service, so everybody piled on the number 21 instead.

Move along please, plenty of room further back. Please stow pushchairs. Hold on tight please.

[Loudon D'Arcy]

Re: Ding ding.

"Next stop, St. Paul's!"

[Am I the only one who read the title of this article and immediately thought of the re-entry scene in the movie "Gravity"?]

[SnailFerrous]

A call to their insurance company for the free windscreen replacement service. Should get it through it's next MOT.

[I ain't Spartacus]

They tried that. But the engineer sent them an email after a few days, saying that "we called and you were out." This uses up your free call-out, and you'll have to pay for us to re-book it.

The taikonauts claimed that they were waiting by the door the whole time, the engineer disagrees and argues that perhaps their doorbell had disconnected from the WiFi network.

The Chinese space agency have been on hold to insurance company's complaints department for the last 3 days. Their call is important to them, but not important enough to actually answer.

[Oneman2Many]

Pretty much the same thing happened with Russian MS-22 and MS-23, the capsule with the mystery leak. Russia sent up an empty capsule.

[M.V. Lipvig]

I don't see spacesuit incompatibility as being an issue, when they could send an unmanned ship up with, wait for it...

wait for it...wait for it...

... extra spacesuits that are compatible. It's a rescue ship, and the taikos would not be expected to perform intricate repairs while wearing them so, as long as they more or less fit and were airtight they'd have been fine.

[Oneman2Many]

Its not about being airtight though that is useful if there is a door seal leak, the suits supply cooling during re-entry as does get quite toasty in the capsule. I did read its survivable needed but definitely welcome.

[Richard 12]

Also, the G loading during reentry is pretty high, especially with the propulsive-impact landings used by Shenzhou (and Soyuz), which are less forgiving than water landings.

If your suit doesn't fit, it's liable to break things, like arms, legs and the odd neck.

That said, their ground team have the necessary measurements, so would indeed send up appropriate suits. It would take a while to make them, though.

[stiine]

What about the seats? Arent' spacecraft seats tailored to the astronaut that's going to be occupying them?

I guess the 'any port in a storm' saying is true in 21st century space as well.

[Anonymous Coward]

Chinese

Take away

[MonsieurTM]

The same Musk that called the heroes in the Thai cave rescue paediphiles? The same Musk that came up with stupid, useless ideas to rescue the trapped people?

The only people who bleat "Musk to the rescue" are trolls.

[Richard 12]

True

Though in this case Dragon would technically work, as it happens that the Chinese station has the ISO standard docking adapters.

It would however mean a US warship picking up the rescued celestial navigators after splashdown. The spacecraft is only one part of this!

On the third hand, there is absolutely no way the Chinese mission controllers would accept that assistance. The loss of face would be astronomical!

_(Sorry)

[Mishak]

US warship

SpaceX use their own ship (MV Shannon) for crew recovery.