Hector Retamal/AFP/Getty Images/File
The Long March 5 rocket carrying the Chang’e-6 lunar probe was launched on May 3, 2024 from the Wenchang Space Launch Center in South China’s Hainan province.
Hong-Kong
CNN
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China’s Chang’e-6 lunar lander successfully landed on the far side of the moon on Sunday morning, Beijing time, in a key step for the ambitious mission that could further the country’s ambitions to land astronauts on the moon.
The Chang’e-6 probe landed in the South Pole-Aitken Basin, where it will collect samples from the lunar surface, the China National Space Administration announced.
The unmanned mission, China’s most complex robotic lunar project to date, aims to return samples from the far side of the moon to Earth for the first time.
The landing marks the second time a mission has successfully reached the far side of the moon. China first completed this historic feat in 2019 with its Chang’e-4 probe.
If all goes according to plan, the mission – which began on May 3 and is expected to last 53 days – could be a major milestone in China’s bid to become a dominant space power.
The country’s plans include landing astronauts on the moon by 2030 and building a research base at the South Pole – an area believed to contain water ice.
Sunday’s landing comes as a growing number of countries, including the United States, consider the strategic and scientific benefits of expanded lunar exploration in an increasingly competitive field.
Samples collected by the Chang’e-6 lander could provide important clues about the origins and evolution of the moon, Earth and solar system, experts say – while the mission itself will provide important data and engineering practices to support China’s lunar ambitions promote.
Chang’e-6 landed in an impact crater known as the Apollo Basin, located in the vast South Pole-Aitken Basin with a diameter of about 2,500 kilometers, according to Chinese state media Xinhua. It orbited the moon for about 20 days as part of a larger probe, which consists of four parts: an orbiter, a lander, a riser and a re-entry module.
It is now expected to use a drill and a mechanical arm to collect up to 2 kilograms of lunar dust and rocks from the basin, a crater that formed about 4 billion years ago.
The probe will spend two days on the far side of the moon and 14 hours to collect soil samples from the moon, Xinhua reported.
To complete its mission, the lander will have to robotically stow these samples in a take-off vehicle that has landed with it.
The ascent vehicle will then return to lunar orbit, where it will dock and transfer the samples to a re-entry capsule, according to mission information provided by the China National Space Administration.
The re-entry capsule and orbiter will then travel back to Earth’s orbit and separate, which is expected to allow the re-entry capsule to return to the Siziwang Banner Landing Site in China’s rural Inner Mongolia region later this month.
The technically complex mission becomes more challenging due to the location where it is carried out. The far side of the moon is beyond the range of normal communications, meaning Chang’e-6 will also have to rely on a satellite launched into lunar orbit in March, Queqiao-2.
China plans to launch two more missions in the Chang-e series as it approaches its 2030 goal of sending astronauts to the moon.
Several countries are expanding their lunar programs, with a growing focus on securing access to resources and further deep space exploration.
Last year, India landed a spacecraft on the moon for the first time, while Russia’s first moon landing mission in decades ended in failure when the Luna 25 probe crashed on the moon’s surface.
In January, Japan became the fifth country to land a spacecraft on the moon, although the Moon Sniper lander suffered power problems due to an incorrect landing angle. The following month, IM-1, a NASA-funded mission designed by the Texas-based private company Intuitive Machines, landed close to the South Pole.
That landing — the first by an American-made spacecraft in more than five decades — is part of a series of planned commercial missions intended to explore the moon’s surface before NASA attempts to return American astronauts there as early as 2026 and carry out its scientific missions. build a base camp.