Chinese astronauts Cai Xuzhe and Song Lingdong achieved a historic milestone during a recent spacewalk outside the Tiangong space station, lasting over nine hours.
This extended extravehicular activity (EVA) was part of China’s three-person Shenzhou 19 mission, occurring from late Monday night into Tuesday morning, as the China Manned Space Engineering Office (CMSEO) reported.
The duo broke the previous record of eight hours and 56 minutes set by NASA astronauts James Voss and Susan Helms in March 2001. This achievement marks a significant moment for the Shenzhou 19 mission, which docked at the Tianong station on October 29 for a six-month tenure.
During their spacewalk, Cai and Song, supported by their crewmate Wang Haoze who remained inside the station, completed tasks, including the installation of a space debris protection device and the inspection and maintenance of extravehicular equipment. CMSEO officials lauded the spacewalk as a “complete success” in a WeChat update.
Highlighting a notable achievement, officials also shared that 34-year-old Song became the first Chinese astronaut born in the 1990s to perform a spacewalk.
According to SpaceNews, the spacewalk commenced at 11:51 PM EDT on Monday, with Cai, the mission commander, first exiting Tiangong’s Wentian module. Song joined him over 90 minutes later at 1:32 AM. The astronauts re-entered the Wentian module by 8:57 AM on Tuesday, making the total EVA duration nine hours and six minutes, thereby surpassing the old record by 10 minutes.
This record-setting EVA was Tiangong’s 17th. The space station’s core module, Tianhe, was launched into orbit in April 2021, followed by the Wentian and Mengtian modules in July and November 2022, respectively, completing the T-shaped orbital outpost.
