China landed an uncrewed spacecraft on the far side of the moon early Sunday Beijing Time, according to a statement.
The Asian country’s Chang’e-6 probe “touched down on the far side of the moon Sunday morning, and will collect samples from this rarely explored terrain for the first time in human history,” a statement from the China National Space Administration (CNSA) read.
The probe will collect samples from beneath the surface using a drill and from the surface using a robotic arm, and then carry the samples back to Earth. The mission to collect and return lunar samples from the moon’s far side is “the first endeavor of its kind in the history of human lunar exploration,” according to the statement.
The probe — comprising an orbiter, a returner, a lander, and an ascender and supported by a relay satellite — landed at 6:23 a.m. Beijing Time (6:23 p.m. ET June 1) in the Apollo Basin as designated. The Apollo Basin is an impact crater within the South Pole-Aitken (SPA) Basin, the statement revealed. The probe’s journey from Earth began May 3, and its descent on the lunar far side took 14 minutes.
The SPA Basin is a large impact crater on the lunar far side, according to the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA).
Chang’e-6 “has achieved a breakthrough in the design and control technology of the lunar retrograde orbit and aims to realize key technologies of intelligent and rapid sampling, as well as takeoff and ascent from the far side of the moon,” according to the CNSA’s statement.
The probe is expected to work autonomously, reducing the number of stepwise commands that the technical crew working on the ground at the Beijing Aerospace Control Center (BACC) in Beijing will need to issue, according to the statement.
With Chang’e-6 successful landing, China becomes the first country to land a spacecraft on the moon’s far side twice. It was the first country to do so, having landed Chang’e-4 in the SPA Basin’s Von Karman Crater in January 2019, according to a separate statement from the CNSA. (RELATED: NASA Launches Solar Sail Mission Into Space In A First)
China‘s latest space exploration success only signifies the tip of the iceberg in China’s space ambitions as a Chang’e-6-like travel to and from Mars involving bringing back samples could be on the table as well, the BBC reported. NASA and the European Space Agency (ESA) are jointly working on a similar sample return from Mars but have been contending with delays, budgeting hitches, and political hurdles, according to the outlet.
NASA’s Perseverance rover has been collecting rock samples from the Red Planet’s surface but returning the samples to Earth — generally accepted as the most consequential part of planetary exploration — before 2040 would require a staggering $11 billion, the BBC separately reported.
The far side of the moon — barren, rocky, and pockmarked with craters — cannot be seen from Earth. NASA astronauts Frank Borman, Jim Lovell, and William Anders became the first humans to glimpse the moon’s far side during the Apollo 8 lunar mission in December 1968, NASA revealed. The crew reportedly reached the moon’s far side 69 hours, eight minutes, and 16 seconds after launch.
