In an interview with China's first astronaut, the pioneering explorer revealed a remarkable experience he had during his historic trip to space.
While flying aboard China's Shenzhou 5 spacecraft back in 2003, Yang Liwei told an interviewer recently, he heard occasionally an unexplained knocking sound that seemed to come from nowhere.
Liwei recalled to China Central Television that "it neither came from outside nor inside the spaceship, but sounded like someone is knocking the body of the spaceship just as knocking an iron bucket with a wooden hammer."
As one might expect, Liwei said that the sound made him nervous and led him to peer out the porthole of the ship searching for the source but he saw nothing.
Upon returning home, he relayed the experience to the Chinese space program, but they had no answers for what may have caused it and could not even replicate it.
Fortunately for Liwei, subsequent Chinese astronauts have also heard the mysterious knocking sound, suggesting it was not a phenomenon of his own making.
The puzzling report is somewhat similar to unexplained whispers reportedly heard by Russian cosmonauts.
Coast Insiders can learn about these strange incidents by checking out author Paul Stonehill's 2/21/2007 appearance on the program.
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Source: China.org.cn