During the launch video monitors showed live images of the three-person crew, which appeared to be calm while reading handbooks.

Astronaut Liu Wang will be mainly in charge of a manual docking of the Shenzhou-9 with the Tiangong-1, a task that will be performed in coming days. Speaking Friday, he said this will be very difficult.

He said the manual rendezvous requires a lot of technology and skills, so he has rehearsed the maneuver more than 1,500 times.

Mission commander Jing Haipeng said he is still excited even though this is his third time in space.

He added that with China's growing space industry, he expects that in the future, there will be many more astronauts who will make multiple missions.

The crew is expected to spend 13 days in space, conducting scientific, medical and technological experiments.