October 15, 2003

Shenzhou 5

China launches Yang Liwei aboard Shenzhou 5 on its first human spaceflight

Yang Liwei learned he was the one flying about 16 hours before launch. The public did not watch it live — CCTV waited until he was safely in orbit.

09:00 Beijing time at Jiuquan

A Long March 2F rocket lifted Shenzhou 5 and astronaut Yang Liwei from the Jiuquan launch center at 9:00 a.m. Beijing time — 01:00 UTC — on 15 October 2003.

The spacecraft separated from the rocket 587 seconds after liftoff and entered an elliptical orbit of 199.14 by 347.8 kilometres, inclined 42.4 degrees.

Yang, a 38-year-old former fighter pilot, had been picked from a three-person finalist group about 16 hours earlier and boarded roughly two hours and 45 minutes before liftoff.

Fourteen orbits and two flags

During the seventh orbit Yang displayed the Chinese and United Nations flags and greeted people around the world.

He completed 14 circuits of Earth. The reentry capsule landed in central Inner Mongolia at 6:23 a.m. on 16 October after 21 hours 23 minutes, a reported 4.8 kilometres from its target, and Yang came out under his own power in good condition.

He later recalled a 26-second vibration during ascent so violent that he thought he might die; subsequent Long March rockets were modified.

Third country, recorded footage

By putting Yang in orbit with a domestically launched spacecraft and rocket, China became the third country after the Soviet Union and the United States to achieve independent human-spaceflight capability. That phrase describes launching capability, not the third nationality ever to reach space.

CCTV did not carry the launch live. It announced success within minutes and broadcast recorded footage shortly afterward.

The launch is what this date marks; the landing that completed the mission came the next morning in Beijing time, and the orbital module stayed in space after the capsule returned.

Sources

Researched 24 Aug 2026 8 sources not yet audited

How this was checked

Researched from the web into a fact sheet and rewritten from that sheet. This article has not yet had an independent model audit. How the pipeline works →

What the sources leave uncertain

The launch date and time are secure in both Beijing time and UTC.
Sources differ by several minutes on the landing time: the China Manned Space Engineering Office gives 06:23 Beijing time, while some secondary accounts give 06:28. This sheet follows the official mission chronology.
The official English CMSE page's claim that the orbital module remained aloft for 707 days conflicts with orbital catalogs that place its reentry on 30 May 2004.