Artist's illustration of China's 8-ton Tiangong-1 space lab, which is expected to fall to Earth late next year, unless it's boosted to a higher altitude. 
 
 China's first-ever space lab will die a fiery death in Earth's atmosphere toward the end of next year, Chinese officials said. 
 
 The 9.4-ton (8.5 metric tons) Tiangong-1 spacecraft is currently intact and orbiting Earth at an altitude of 230 miles (370 kilometers), according to Wu Ping, deputy director of China's Manned Space Engineering office. That's a bit lower than the International Space Station, which usually stays about 250 miles (400 km) above the planet's surface. 
 
 Tiangong-1 will likely fall back to Earth in the second half of 2017, and its demise shouldn't cause problems here on the ground, Wu said. [Gallery: Tiangong 1, China's First Space Laboratory] 
 
 "Based on our calculation and analysis, most parts of the space lab will burn up during falling," she said during a news conference Wednesday (Sept. 14), according to China's state-run Xinhua news agency. 
 
 China is monitoring Tiangong-1 (whose name means "Heavenly Palace" in Mandarin) closely and will issue the appropriate warnings if the space lab threatens to hit a satellite, Wu added. She said that China will release a forecast of Tiangong-1's fall to Earth "if necessary," according to Xinhua. 
 
 The update from Wu seems to confirm speculation that China is no longer in control of the 34-foot-long (10.3 meters) Tiangong-1, which launched in September 2011 to test out docking technologies and other skills that China will need to build its planned space station in the early 2020s. 
 
 After all, if operators were still controlling the space lab, they could steer it to a guided re-entry over an empty stretch of ocean at a specified time. 
 
 Three spacecraft docked with Tiagong-1 during its operational life — Shenzhou-8 in November 2011, Shenzhou-9 in June 2012 and Shenzhou-10 in June 2013. The latter two missions were crewed, each carrying three Chinese "taikonauts" up to the space lab. 
 
 Tiangong-1 stopped sending data back to Earth in March 2016, officially ending the space lab's mission. But its successor is now aloft: Tiangong-2 launched atop a Long March 2F rocket on Sept. 15 from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center in northwestern China. 
 
 Two taikonauts are scheduled to arrive at Tiangong-2 in mid- to late October for a 30-day stay, Chinese officials have said. (The Shenzhou-9 and Shenzhou-10 crews spent eight and 12 days aboard Tiangong-1, respectively.) 
 
 China is not part of the multinational consortium, led by the United States and Russia, that operates the 440-ton (400 metric ton) International Space Station. China aims to have its own 60-ton (54 metric tons) space station up and running in Earth orbit by 2022 or so. 
 
 Follow Mike Wall on Twitter @michaeldwall and Google+. Follow us @Spacedotcom, Facebook or Google+. Originally published on Space.com. 

 Photo taken on Sept. 14, 2016 shows the press conference about the Tiangong-2 space lab in Jiuquan, northwest China's Gansu Province. China will launch the Tiangong-2 space lab from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center in northwestern China's Gobi Desert at 10:04 p.m. on Sept. 15. (Xinhua/Ju Zhenhua) 
 
 JIUQUAN, Sept. 14 (Xinhua) -- China's first space lab Tiangong-1 is expected to fall into the Earth's atmosphere in the latter half of 2017, after about six years in space, a senior official with the country's manned space program said Wednesday. 
 
 Tiangong-1 was launched in September 2011 and ended its data service in March this year, when it had "comprehensively fulfilled its historical mission," said Wu Ping, deputy director of the manned space engineering office, at a press conference here. 
 
 The space lab is currently intact and orbiting at an average height of 370 kilometers, Wu said. 
 
 It was in service for four and a half years, two and a half years longer than its designed life, and had docked with Shenzhou-8, Shenzhou-9 and Shenzhou-10 spacecraft and undertaken a series of tasks, making important contributions to China's manned space cause, Wu said. 
 
 "Based on our calculation and analysis, most parts of the space lab will burn up during falling," she said, adding that it was unlikely to affect aviation activities or cause damage to the ground. 
 
 China has always highly valued the management of space debris, conducting research and tests on space debris mitigation and cleaning, Wu said. 
 
 Now, China will continue to monitor Tiangong-1 and strengthen early warning for possible collision with objects. If necessary, China will release a forecast of its falling and report it internationally, said Wu. 
 
 The official said China will launch its Tiangong-2 space lab at 10:04 p.m. Thursday.
– In 2017, watch for falling space labs. China announced last week that its first space lab, Tiangong-1, would be falling back to Earth—somewhere—sometime in the second half of next year, Xinhuanet reports. According to Popular Mechanics, the lack of specifics in the previous sentence seems to confirm the theory that China lost control of the space lab some time ago, otherwise it would probably be scheduled to burn up in the atmosphere somewhere over the ocean. As it is, there's a chance—albeit a small one—that pieces of the space lab that don't burn up in the atmosphere could land in a populated area. It's also possible some of the debris could hit a satellite, Space.com reports. China says it will release a forecast of the fall of the 34-foot-long, 9.4-ton Tiangong-1 "if necessary." Experts believe the space lab was damaged in some way that made China lose control of it, hence the lack of a controlled re-entry. Tiangong-1, currently orbiting about 230 miles above the Earth, was launched in 2011 and decommissioned last March after it had—in the words of one official—"comprehensively fulfilled its historical mission." China is scheduled to launch its replacement, Tiangong-2, on Thursday. The country, which doesn't use the International Space Station, is working toward the launch of its own space station around 2022. (China recently completed the world's biggest telescope.)