Zhang Xiaoguang

Zhang Xiaoguang
Country:	People's Republic of China
Organization:	Space Corps of the People's Liberation Army
selected on	January 5, 1998
Calls:	1 space flight
Begin:	11th of June 2013
Landing:	June 26, 2013
Time in space:	14d 14h 29min
Space flights
Shenzhou 10 (2013)

Zhang Xiaoguang ( Chinese  张晓光 , Pinyin Zhāng Xiǎoguāng ; born May 1966 in Baichangmen , Liaoning Province , People's Republic of China ) is a Chinese fighter pilot and a member of the Space Corps of the People's Liberation Army .

Youth and service in the Air Force

Zhang Xiaoguang was established in May 1966 at the village Chengxi (城西村) the greater community Baichangmen the circle Heishan the prefecture-level city Jinzhou born in northeast China, he has two older sisters and an older brother. His father worked at the town hall of Baichangmen, his mother died in 1997, managed the family farm, then part of the people's commune Baichangmen. Like two thirds of the residents of his home parish, Zhang is Manchu . In September 1974, at the age of eight, he began to attend Baichangmen Central Elementary School (白 厂 门 中心 小学), about 2 km away from his village. At that time one was still in the cultural revolution ; Classes took place in the morning, and in the afternoon the children helped out in the People's Commune. The quality of the already sparse teaching left a lot to be desired. Because of a lack of basic knowledge of reading and arithmetic, Zhang was only in the middle of the field for the exams in the lower grades of high school. His siblings had had similar problems - the sisters had dropped out of secondary school and his brother wasn't a good student either - so the parents put all their hopes in him. Gradually, Zhang's academic performance also improved, and he passed the high school entrance exam at Heishan's 3rd District High School.

In March 1985 - he was just about to finish his high school diploma - the Air Force of the People's Republic of China was just recruiting a new class of pilots. While reviewing the general provisions on the admission of students to the pilot's academy, he had doubts - it was necessary, in that order, absolute political reliability, excellent physical condition and a comprehensive general education - but then he and his classmates went from the 3rd County High School for Physical Aptitude Assessment for 3rd Air Force Pilot Academy in Jinzhou. The draft, political examination, and general education test all passed, and since he got the required high school diploma, Zhang Xiaoguang joined the People's Liberation Army in June 1985 . Like his future astronaut colleague Yang Liwei two years earlier , Zhang Xiaoguang first attended the Air Force's 2nd Basic Training School in Baoding (中国人民解放军 空军 第二 航空 预备 学校). After three years of basic training, he switched to the Air Force's 12th Pilot Academy in Linfen (空军 第十二 飞行 学院), where he studied the theory of aviation for a year and completed his first training flights.

In 1989, Zhang Xiaoguang returned to his homeland to complete his pilot training at the 3rd Pilot Academy, where he graduated in October 1990, a year and a half after his future astronauts Liu Boming and Zhai Zhigang , who had joined the People's Liberation Army at the same time as he was. He was then stationed at the Luliang Air Force Base, which was built in World War II - at that time the largest military airport in Asia - in the east of Yunnan Province . He made it up to the leader of a fighter squadron and completed more than 1000 accident-free flight hours during his active time as a pilot, for which he was awarded the level I military aircraft pilot .

Service in the space corps

In 1996, Zhang Xiaoguang was one of 1,506 fighter pilots who passed the first round of selection for the People's Republic of China's new manned space program . After further rounds of selection, he was finally one of 14 candidates who were sworn in on January 5, 1998 as a spaceman of the Space Corps of the People's Liberation Army . After five and a half years of training, he and his comrades went to the Jiuquan Cosmodrome on September 20 to practice in the real spacecraft - Shenzhou 5 - intended for China's first manned mission . However, he did not make it into the group of the last three candidates selected for the flight in early October, and on October 15, 2003, it was Yang Liwei who took off on China's first manned space flight.

Also in 2005, at Shenzhou 6 , Zhang Xiaoguang did not make it into the group of the last candidates. When he did not even make it into the shortlist of the first ten candidates for Shenzhou 7 in 2007 , Zhang fell into depression , which he first tried to combat by listening to orchestral music. In August 2009, he and a few comrades went to the 1st sanatorium of the former Jinan military district in Qingdao (济南 军区 青岛 第一 疗养院, known as “gas station” or 加油站 among astronauts) to seek medical help to take. The calm by the sea did him good. He became fully operational again and was selected in 2012, along with Nie Haisheng and Wang Yaping, for the reserve team of the Shenzhou 9 mission .

In March 2013 he was then selected together with Nie Haisheng, for whom this was the second space flight after Shenzhou 6, and Wang Yaping as the primary team for the Shenzhou 10 mission , during which a twelve-day stay on the Tiangong 1 space station was planned. On June 4, 2013, the astronauts arrived at the Jiuquan Cosmodrome , in the early afternoon of June 11, they had already put on their cabin suits, they were briefly visited by President Xi Jinping , then the team took off at 17:38 local time. In addition to serious things like a manual docking maneuver performed by Nie Haisheng on June 23, Wang Yaping held a video-broadcasted class of physical experiments in weightlessness during that mission. Zhang Xiaoguang acted as cameraman.

Zhang Xiaoguang joined the Chinese Communist Party in August 1988, while he was still studying at the Linfen Air Force Aviation Academy . Since March 3, 2018, he and his fellow astronaut and party colleague Yang Liwei have been sitting in the Political Consultative Conference of the Chinese People as one of 136 specially invited personalities (regul 邀请 人士), i.e. in addition to the regular CCP members .

marital status

Zhang Xiaoguang has been married to military nurse Zhang Ji (张继) since June 22, 1993; her son was born in November 1997 in Sichuan , where his wife worked in a sanatorium. The wife and child have lived in the space city in Beijing's Haidian district since 1998 , but separated from their husband and father (the space travelers are housed in their own building and can only see their families on weekends).

See also

• List of spacemen

Individual evidence

1. ↑ ^{a b} 张兆曦: 张晓光 的 追梦 历程. In: ln.ifeng.com. June 21, 2013, accessed July 12, 2020 (Chinese). 
2. ↑ 光化 军: 辽宁 省 锦州 黑山县 白 厂 门 镇. In: tcmap.com.cn. Retrieved July 12, 2020 (Chinese). 
3. ↑ ^{a b c d} 张晓光: 航天 员 张晓光 的 成长 故事 …… In: zhuanlan.zhihu.com. January 12, 2020, accessed July 12, 2020 (Chinese). 
4. ↑ 司 晓 帅: 张晓光 的 老师 及 同窗 ： 他 是 一个 不 言 放弃 的 少年. In: chinanews.com. June 11, 2013, accessed July 19, 2020 (Chinese). 
5. ↑ 黑山 中学. In: heishan.gov.cn. April 14, 2009, accessed July 12, 2020 (Chinese). 
6. ↑ 司 晓 帅: 张晓光 同学 回忆 ： 2 毛钱 车费 成就 其 航天 梦. In: chinanews.com. June 10, 2013, accessed July 12, 2020 (Chinese). 
7. ↑ ^{a b c} 张晓光. In: aihangtian.com. February 19, 2015, accessed July 13, 2020 (Chinese). 
8. ↑ Mark Wade: Yang Liwei in the Encyclopedia Astronautica , accessed on July 13, 2020 (English).
9. ↑ Mark Wade: Zhai Zhigang in the Encyclopedia Astronautica , accessed on July 13, 2020 (English).
10. ↑ ^{a b} 张继: 航天 员 张晓光 妻子 回忆 老公 遇到 的 那些 坎儿. In: mod.gov.cn. March 14, 2018, accessed July 14, 2020 (Chinese). 
11. ↑ 杨 茹: 解放军 培养 女飞行员 数量 世界 第一 ： 两名 升空. In: xinhuanet.com. March 8, 2016, accessed July 13, 2020 (Chinese).  Submarine drivers and combat swimmers are also treated in this special hospital .
12. ↑ 孙 力 为: 济南 军区 青岛 第一 疗养院. In: mod.gov.cn. September 12, 2014, accessed July 13, 2020 (Chinese). 
13. ↑ 孙进军: 逐 梦 太空 写 忠诚. In: theory.people.com.cn. August 7, 2017, accessed July 14, 2020 (Chinese). 
14. ↑ Jason Davis: China readies three taikonauts for station visit. Planetary Society, June 12, 2012, accessed July 13, 2020 . 
15. ↑ 潘旭海 、 赵 纲: 习近平 ： 期待 你们 凯旋. In: politics.people.com.cn. June 11, 2013, accessed July 14, 2020 (Chinese).  The general at the beginning of the video is Zhang Youxia , then the commander of the People's Republic of China's manned space program .
16. ↑ Taikonaut Wang Yaping gives physics lesson from space. China Radio International, June 20, 2013, accessed July 14, 2020 . 
17. ↑ Astronauts of Shenzhou-10 mission meet press. In: zhuanti.spacechina.com. June 11, 2013, accessed on July 14, 2020 . 
18. ↑ 中国 人民 政治协商会议 第十 三届 全国 委员会 委员 名单. In: cppcc.gov.cn. May 11, 2020, accessed July 14, 2020 (Chinese). 
19. ↑ 航天 员 张小光 的 妻子 是 做 什么 工作. In: zhidao.baidu.com. February 3, 2018, accessed July 14, 2020 (Chinese). 

Web links

• Space facts: [1]

Note: This article places the family name before the person's first name. This is the usual order in Chinese. Zhang is the family name here, Xiaoguang is the first name.