Another Chinese Space Launch

China sent its first woman astronaut (Liu Yang) to space this week as the Shenzhou-9 spacecraft successfully docked with the orbiting Tiangong-1 space laboratory on Monday.  The Tiangong-1 was placed in orbit last fall as a prototype of a larger station to follow in 2020.  Over a 10-day period, three Chinese astronauts will stay aboard the "space station" to conduct tests. 

The great space race continues, with both the private sector (SpaceX) and other nations taking the lead.  China has already moved up its manned moon-landing to 2016, showing an increasing confidence in its space capabilities.  While the U.S. has lost its shuttles and will lose the $100 billion International Space Station by 2020, others are stepping up the challenge with broad plans for expansion.  SpaceX is even talking about $500,000 trips to Mars while the U.S. has no such plans on the drawing board.