Chinese astronauts stuck in space after debris damages return capsule – National
Their return to Earth was originally scheduled for Wednesday but their mission has been temporarily extended due to “a suspected impact from tiny space debris,” the China Manned Space Agency announced.
“The decision to delay the return aims to ensure the astronauts’ safety and mission success,” the statement added.
Engineers are currently conducting impact analysis and risk assessments on the damaged spacecraft.
Their return date has been postponed indefinitely, according to state broadcaster CCTV, which offered no further details.
The three astronauts from the Shenzhou-20 mission — team leader Chen Dong, fighter pilot Chen Zhongrui and engineer Wang Jie — flew to the Tiangong space station in April and were finishing their six-month rotation.
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Their replacements on the Shenzhou-21 mission, astronauts Zhang Lu, Wu Fei and Zhang Hongzhang, successfully docked onto the space station on Saturday.
The return capsule is believed to have been hit by space junk, which is sometimes a hazard in low Earth orbit; if the spacecraft is beyond repair, the Shenzhou-20 crew will descend to Earth aboard the Shenzhou-21 team’s capsule.
Chinese astronauts Zhang Lu (front), Wu Fei (C) and Zhang Hongzhang attend a send-off ceremony at the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center in northwest China on Oct. 31, 2025.
Lian Zhen/Xinhua via ZUMA Press
China has made steady progress with its space program since 2003. It has built its own space station and has a goal of landing a person on the moon by 2030.
The news of the astronauts stuck in space comes months after NASA astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams successfully splashed down near Tallahassee, Fla., after nine months at the International Space Station.
Wilmore and Williams were expected to be gone just a week or so after launching on Boeing’s new Starliner crew capsule on June 5, 2024. Many problems cropped up on the way to the space station and NASA eventually sent Starliner back empty and transferred the test pilots to SpaceX, pushing their homecoming into February. Then, SpaceX capsule issues added another month’s delay.
Wilmore and Williams ended up spending a total of 286 days in space — 278 days longer than anticipated when they launched. They had circled Earth 4,576 times and travelled 195 million kilometres by the time of splashdown in March.
Wilmore, Williams, NASA astronaut Nick Hague and Russian cosmonaut Aleksandr Gorbunov were greeted by a pod of dolphins that circled the capsule in the clear blue waters as divers readied it for hoisting onto the recovery ship.
— With files from The Associated Press
© 2025 Global News, a division of Corus Entertainment Inc.
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