Jing Haipeng


Jing Haipeng is a Chinese pilot and astronaut selected as part of the Shenzhou program. A fighter pilot in the People's Liberation Army Air Force, he was selected to be a CNSA astronaut in 1998. He is the first Chinese astronaut to have flown on three missions: Shenzhou 7, Shenzhou 9 and Shenzhou 11.

Career

Jing was one of the six trainees for the Shenzhou 6 mission.
Jing, along with Liu Boming and Zhai Zhigang were selected for the prime crew on Shenzhou 7 on September 17, 2008. On September 25, 2008, at 21:10 CST, they launched into space as the first three-man crew for China aboard China's third human spaceflight mission.
Jing was selected as commander of Shenzhou 9, becoming the first repeat traveller of the Chinese program. He commanded the first manned mission to dock with the first Chinese space station, Tiangong 1, with the first female astronaut, Liu Yang. The third member of his crew was Liu Wang. The mission was launched on 16 June 2012, returning to Earth on 29 June.
On October 15, 2016, a press release indicated Jing Haipeng would be the commander of the Shenzhou 11 mission, that was slated for departure only two days later.
The Shenzhou 11 launched at 07:30 on 17 October 2016 local time from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center using a Long March 2F launch rocket. The crew landed successfully after the 33 day mission on 18 November 2016.The reentry module of the Shenzhou-11 spacecraft landed in Inner Mongolia around 2.15 p.m after detaching from the space lab on 17 November. After landing Jing Haipeng holds the record for the most cumulative time in space by a Chinese citizen with 47 days.
In July 2017, Chairman Xi Jinping awarded Jing the Order of August First, the highest military award of People's Republic of China.