In 2012, China became the third nation to send women into space with its own

space program A space program is an organized effort by a government or a company with a goal related to outer space. Lists of space programs include: * List of government space agencies * List of private spaceflight companies * List of human spaceflight prog ...

, after the

Soviet Union The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, ...

Russia Russia (, , ), or the Russian Federation, is a transcontinental country spanning Eastern Europe and Northern Asia. It is the largest country in the world, with its internationally recognised territory covering , and encompassing one-eig ...

and the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territori ...

, 49 years after the first female cosmonaut,

Valentina Tereshkova Valentina Vladimirovna Tereshkova ( rus, Валентина Владимировна Терешкова, links=no, p=vɐlʲɪnʲˈtʲinə vlɐˈdʲimʲɪrəvnə tʲɪrʲɪʂˈkovə, a=Valentina Tereshkova.ogg; born 6 March 1937) is an engine ...

History

Following the successful piloted flight of '' Shenzhou 5'' in October 2003, China announced plans to send a woman into space as well. Gu Xiulian, president of the

All-China Women's Federation The All-China Women's Federation (ACWF; ) is a women's rights people's organization established in China on 24 March 1949. It was originally called the All-China Democratic Women's Foundation, and was renamed the All-China Women's Federation in ...

(ACWF), told a gathering that she proposed that women, too, should be trained for space missions after China's first piloted space trip. Initially, the criteria for women to be selected, included having been married, having had a child, having no bad health problems. The marriage and having had children criteria were later said to have been dropped. On 16 June 2012, Major Liu Yang was the first Chinese woman launched into space aboard the

Shenzhou 9 Shenzhou 9 () was the fourth crewed spacecraft flight of China's Shenzhou program, launched at 18:37:24 CST (10:37:24 UTC), 16 June 2012. Shenzhou 9 was the second spacecraft and first crewed mission and expedition to dock with the Tiangong-1 ...

with two male counterparts to the Chinese space station

Tiangong-1 Tiangong-1 () was China's first prototype space station. It orbited Earth from September 2011 to April 2018, serving as both a crewed laboratory and an experimental testbed to demonstrate orbital rendezvous and docking capabilities during its ...

. Liu was not drawn from the fighter pilot cadre, but instead is a veteran PLAAF transport pilot. The mission took off at 6:37 p.m. (10:37 UTC) from the

Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center (JSLC; also known as Shuangchengzi Missile Test Center; Launch Complex B2; formally Northwest Comprehensive Missile Testing Facility (); Base 20; 63600 Unit) is a Chinese space vehicle launch facility ( sp ...

on the edge of the Gobi Desert. She launched on the 49th anniversary of the launch of

Vostok 6 Vostok 6 (russian: Восток-6, ''Orient 6'' or ''East 6'') was the first human spaceflight to carry a woman, cosmonaut Valentina Tereshkova, into space. Mission The spacecraft was launched on 16 June 1963. While Vostok 5 had been delayed by ...

, the first spaceshot of a woman,

. On 16 June 2013, the 50th anniversary of the launch of

, two women were in space, one of them Chinese, the second Chinese woman in space,

Wang Yaping Wang Yaping (; born January 1980) is a Chinese military transport pilot and taikonaut. Wang was the second female taikonaut selected to the People's Liberation Army Astronaut Corps, the second Chinese woman in space, and the first Chinese w ...

, aboard Tiangong-1 on the 3-man

Shenzhou 10 Shenzhou 10 () was a crewed spaceflight of China's Shenzhou program that was launched on 11 June 2013. It was China's fifth crewed space mission. The mission had a crew of three astronauts: Nie Haisheng, who was mission commander and previous ...

mission, and Karen Nyberg on the 6-man Expedition 36 aboard the

International Space Station The International Space Station (ISS) is the largest modular space station currently in low Earth orbit. It is a multinational collaborative project involving five participating space agencies: NASA (United States), Roscosmos (Russia), JAXA ( ...

. The mission had lifted off on 11 June 2013. Zhou Chengyu, a 24-year-old Chinese engineer, was a commander in the

Chang'e 5 Chang'e 5 () was the fifth lunar exploration mission of the Chinese Lunar Exploration Program, and China's first lunar sample-return mission. Like its predecessors, the spacecraft is named after the Chinese moon goddess Chang'e. It launched ...

Moon exploration programme, launched on 23 November 2020. On 15 October 2021, Colonel

was the first Chinese woman to travel twice to space aboard Shenzhou 13 with two male counterparts to the Tiangong space station. The mission took off at 00:23 a.m. (16:23 UTC) from the

on the edge of the Gobi Desert.

List of Chinese women in space by mission

:''These women are Chinese who have flown into space''

Firsts and records

Updated as of December 4, 2022.

References

Citations

Sources