"We have been told our (unprecedented) live broadcast of the launch will be on the 15th. But we do not know the exact time of the launch on the day," a China Central Television news centre official told AFP.

Several analysts had tipped October 15 and state-run Phoenix TV, broadcast from Hong Kong, also Wednesday quoted reliable sources as confirming this was the preliminary timeframe.

"Relevant sources said that upon close examination of the weather and other important elements, the preliminary launch date of the Shenzhou V has been set for October 15," Phoenix said.

The date is a day after the end of a key communist party meeting in Beijing attended by the country's top brass, allowing them the opportunity to make their way to the launch site in the country's northwest.

Despite Wednesday firming as the most likely scenario, some newspapers cite October 16 as the sentimental favourite as it coincides with the 39th anniversary of the detonation of China's first atomic bomb.

This made China only the third nation to possess the nuclear device after the former Soviet Union and the United States, in the same way that its manned space mission will put China in tandem with the world heavyweights as the only countries to send a man into space.

Xie Guangxuan, an engineer who headed the unmanned Shenzhou III mission, said the Chinese would follow the example of the Soviets and Americans when they made their maiden manned flights in the 1960s, the Oriental Morning News reported.

When Russian Yuri Gagarin became the first human in space in 1961, his flight lasted 108 minutes. Days later American Alan Shepard spent just 15 minutes on a suborbital flight.

Xie, who now works for the China Academy of Sciences, was quoted as saying the Shenzhou V flight would last around 90 mintues.

"As far as I know concerning the testing and check ups, all preparations for the launch of the Shenzhou at present are going smoothly," said Xie.

Experts believe just one astronaut will make the trip, selected from a team of 14.

Four unmanned Shenzhou capsules have so far been been launched since 1999.

The CCTV official said the craft will take off from a launch pad in Inner Mongolia with the Jiuquan Space Launch Center in northwestern Gansu province coordinating the historic event.

The centre has three launch pads in the vicinity, and Shenzhou V will leave from the one some 200 kilometres (124 miles) north in Inner Mongolia, CCTV said.

The facility was built in the 1960s as China's first ballistic missile and satellite launch centre and has been used extensively in China's satellite and space program.

Xie said that space administrators were most concerned about the re-entry of the capsule when it goes through a "black barrier" some 80 kilometersmiles) from the earth's surface and losses contact with Chinese ground stations.

For some 30 kilometers (18.6 miles), as the capsule goes through the earth's atmosphere, temperatures will reach up to 2,000 degrees centigrade, he said.

"During the Shenzhou series of flights, there has been one difficulty and that has been the re-entry of the space capsule."

The capsule is expected to land in Inner Mongolia.

According to the Hong Kong-based Ta Kung Pao newspaper, three domestic media outlets -- CCTV, Xinhua news agency and the People's Daily -- have been given permission to report from inside the launch site.

China has never before allowed live pictures of its space missions.

SPACE.WIRE