Chinese people see their second manned space flight off
(AP)
Updated: 2005-10-13 10:15

But the decision to engage the public by showing Wednesday's launch already appeared to be paying dividends.

At the Xiang Ming Middle School in Shanghai, students in teacher Feng Qiang's science class watched on a projection TV and cheered when the capsule reached orbit. They held up handpainted signs saying, "My heart takes flight," and "Celebrate the successful launch."

"It's a very great day for our country," said 15-year-old Seymour Lee. "It feels like we've been waiting 50 years for it."

The mission this week is expected to be longer, more complex and possibly riskier than the 2003 flight, which carried one person and lasted just 21 1/2 hours.

The government did not say how long Fei and Nie would stay aloft, but news reports said it could be three to five days. The official Xinhua News Agency reported they had food and water for a week.

State television broadcast updates throughout the day, showing more live scenes of the astronauts — known in Chinese as yuhangyuan, or "travelers of the universe" — taking off their bulky, 22-pound spacesuits and moving around their cabin.

Both Fei, 41, and Nie, who celebrates his 41st birthday Thursday, are military officers, former fighter pilots and Communist Party members.

Xinhua said both men talked to their families from orbit.

"May you carry out the task entrusted to you by the motherland and return smoothly," Fei's wife, Wang Jie, was quoted as saying. The report said Nie's wife wished him luck, and "at these words, Nie Haisheng was in tears."

The Shenzhou — or Divine Vessel — capsule is based on Russia's workhorse Soyuz, though with extensive modifications. China also bought technology for spacesuits, life-support systems and other equipment from Moscow, though officials say all of the items launched into space are Chinese-made.

China has had a rocketry program since the 1950s and fired its first satellite into orbit in 1970. It regularly launches satellites for foreign clients aboard its giant Long March boosters.

Chinese space officials say they hope to land an unmanned probe on the moon by 2010 and want to launch a space station.