It will take less than 10 minutes for a Long March 2F rocket to send two astronauts inside the Shenzhou 11 space capsule on course toward a docking with China’s Tiangong 2 space lab.
The 191-foot-tall (58-meter) rocket is scheduled to blast off from the Jiuquan space center in northwestern China’s Inner Mongolia territory at 2330 GMT (7:30 p.m. EDT), or around sunrise Monday at the launch site.
Astronauts Jing Haipeng and Chen Dong will be aboard the Shenzhou 11 spaceship, beginning a 33-day mission in orbit.
T-0:00:01: Ignition
The Long March 2F rocket’s first stage and four liquid-fueled boosters ignite and throttle up to 1.4 million pounds of total thrust.
T-0:00:00: Liftoff
The 191-foot-tall (58-meter) Long March 2F rocket lifts off from the Jiuquan satellite launching center.
T+0:00:12: Pitch and roll program
The Long March 2F rocket begins a pitch-over maneuver to steer on the proper heading toward orbit.
T+0:02:35: Escape tower jettison
The launch abort system, which would be used by the crew to escape the Long March rocket in the event of a mishap, is jettisoned after it is no longer needed.
T+0:02:35: Booster separation
Moments after the boosters drain their hydrazine and nitrogen tetroxide propellant, the rockets are jettisoned from the Long March 2F first stage.
T+0:02:40: First stage separation
The Long March 2F first stage separates about four seconds after the strap-on boosters are jettisoned. The second stage ignites moments later.
T+0:03:30: Fairing separation
The aerodynamic shroud covering the Shenzhou 9 spacecraft is released once the Long March rocket flies out of the lower atmosphere.
T+0:08:45: Shenzhou 11 separation
The Shenzhou 11 spacecraft separates from the second stage of the Long March 2F rocket. The launch is targeting an orbit with an inclination of 42.8 degrees. Shenzhou 11’s power-generating solar panels will be extended a few minutes later.
Russian managers have delayed the launch of a Russian-U.S.-Japanese crew to the International Space Station two weeks until early July to allow time for additional software testing on an upgraded version of the Soyuz spacecraft.
SpaceX test-fired the Falcon 9 rocket early Saturday ahead of launch with the next four astronauts heading to the International Space Station. The static fire test before sunrise Saturday in Florida was a major step toward liftoff Thursday.
A towering mobile platform for the agency’s Space Launch System arrived at launch pad 39B Friday at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida for a sequence of water and propellant flow tests, swing arm checkouts and other rehearsals that should conclude with managers declaring the spaceport’s ground systems ready to support the first SLS launch campaign by the end of the year.
