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A visitant looks astatine a mural showing an artist's rendering of China's abstraction presumption astatine the World Robot Conference successful Beijing, Saturday, Sept. 11, 2021. Three Chinese astronauts person departed from the countrys orbiting abstraction presumption successful mentation for returning to Earth aft 90 days successful orbit, the nationalist abstraction bureau reported Thursday, Sept. 16, 2021. (AP Photo/Mark Schiefelbein)

BEIJING – A trio of Chinese astronauts returned to world Friday aft a 90-day enactment aboard their nation’s archetypal abstraction presumption successful China’s longest ngo yet.

Nie Haisheng, Liu Boming and Tang Hongbo landed successful the Shenzhou-12 spaceship conscionable aft 1:30 p.m. (0530 GMT) aft having undocked from the abstraction presumption Thursday morning.

State broadcaster CCTV showed footage of the spacecraft parachuting to onshore successful the Gobi Desert wherever it was met by helicopters and off-road vehicles. Minutes later, a unit of technicians began opening the hatch of the capsule, which appeared undamaged.

After launching connected June 17, ngo commandant Nie and astronauts Liu and Tang went connected 2 spacewalks, deployed a 10-meter (33-foot) mechanical arm, and had a video telephone with Communist Party person Xi Jinping.

While fewer details person been made nationalist by China’s military, which runs the abstraction program, astronaut trios are expected to beryllium brought connected 90-day missions to the presumption implicit the adjacent 2 years to marque it afloat functional.

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The authorities has not announced the names of the adjacent acceptable of astronauts nor the motorboat day of Shenzhou-13.

China has sent 14 astronauts into abstraction since 2003, erstwhile it became lone the 3rd state aft the erstwhile Soviet Union and the United States to bash truthful connected its own.

China embarked connected its ain abstraction presumption programme aft being excluded from the International Space Station, mostly owed to U.S. objections to the Chinese abstraction program's secrecy and subject backing.

Copyright 2021 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This worldly whitethorn not beryllium published, broadcast, rewritten oregon redistributed without permission.