China's Shenzhou II blasts off to space on Monday with two astronauts in Northern China.
This is believed to be the longest manned space mission, sending two astronauts into orbit to spend a month as the country moved a step closer to establish it's permanent space station by 2022.
ALSO SEE: The rocket that landed on a comet after spending 10 years in space.
The two Chinese astronauts, Jing Haipeng, who has already been to space twice, and 37-year old Chen Dong were blasted off on a long March rocket at 7:30am on Monday by Shenzhou-11[heavenly vessel] from the Jiuquan satelite launch centre near the Gobi desert in Northwest China.
ALSO READ: China's spacecraft Tiangong-1 is expected to crash land into earth in 2017.
They will dock with the experimental Tiangong 2 space lab and spend 30 days there. It will take the astronauts approximately two days to reach the orbiting laboratory during which they will conduct tests on spacecrafts related technologies, scientific and engineering experiments, which will also involve analysing plant growth in space and giving themselves ultrasounds to scan their body performances.
In a bid to catch up with the US and Europe, China has invested billions of dollars into it's space program.
World's most renowned analysts has confirmed that at China's current pace, China may become the world's most powerful nation in 2030 due to it's advancements in technology.
Researches show that China has an estimate of $2.2bn spent on space programs annually with over 181 Chinese satellites that are orbiting in space. One of the astronauts, Mr Jin, said
" There is definitely some pressure with this mission. I have been dreaming about it at night" . This will be his third voyage to space and he is to celebrate his 50th birthday in space.
" I am not thinking about the bouquets, the applause or the glory. what i have been thinking about is weather i have grapsed all the knowledge and skills, weather i have addressed the weak areas."
In 2013, three Chinese astronauts spent 15 days in orbit and docked with a space laboratory, the Tiangong 1[ reports suggest this spacecraft will crash-land into earth in 2017]…
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