(Yicai Global) Sept. 17 -- Three Chinese taikonauts -- Tang Hongbo, Nie Haisheng and Liu Boming -- returned home today after three months aboard China’s first space station, the Tianhe, breaking the record for the longest time spent in space by a Chinese crew.

Tang, Nie and Liu salute the ground crew before departing from the space station to begin their journey back to the Earth yesterday morning.

The Long March-2F Y12 rocket carrying the Shenzhou-12 spacecraft with the three taikonauts aboard blasts off from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center in China’s northwest Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region on June 17.

Tang, Nie and Liu tuck into apples while working in the space station’s core module.

Liu and Tang set up externally-mounted equipment on July 4.

The taikonauts speak live with scientists, teachers and students in Hong Kong on Sept. 3.

Editor: Futura Costaglione