See-off ceremony held for Shenzhou XII mission astronauts

China launched its seventh manned spaceflight on Thursday morning, sending three astronauts to the core module of its permanent space station.

A 20-story-tall Long March 2F carrier rocket blasted off at 9:22 am at the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center in northwestern China's Gobi Desert, hurtling into the blue sky with the Shenzhou XII spacecraft on top of the gigantic rocket.

After about 10 minutes, the vehicle placed the 8-metric-ton spaceship in a low-Earth orbit about 390 kilometers above the ground.

[Video by Zhao Lei]

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