Chinese Astronauts Performed Emergency Space Station Repairs Following Debris Impact [Video]

China’s space station crew carried out two spacewalks this past winter to repair the solar wings attached to the core module, which had been damaged by space debris.

The Tiangong space station’s core module, Tianhe, suffered a partial loss of power due to the impact, leading China to dispatch its astronauts on a pair of spacewalks for orbital repairs. The recent spacewalks were historic, marking the first time China’s astronauts had to conduct repair work in orbit. As the state-run media outlet Xinhua now reports, these repairs were successful, fixing the core module’s solar wings.

The Shenzhou 17 crew members—astronauts Tang Hongbo, Tang Shengjie, and Jiang Xinlin—spent nearly 16 hours tethered to the space station during the two spacewalks, the first on December 1, 2023, and the second on March 1, 2024, according to the China Manned Space Agency (CMSA). The space station’s solar arrays are now fully functional, according to Xinhua, noting that the …