China launched an unmanned lunar mission this Friday (3) that aims to return samples from the other side of the moon for the first time, in a potentially big step for the country's ambitious space program.
The Chang'E-6 probe – China's most complex robotic lunar mission to date – lifted off on a Long March-5 rocket from the Wenchang Space Launch Center on southern China's Hainan island, where fans gathered to witness the historic moment.
The launch marks the start of a mission that is intended to be a major milestone in China's push to become a dominant space power with plans to land astronauts on the moon by 2030 and build a research base at its south pole.
The mission comes as a growing number of countries, including the United States, seek the strategic and scientific benefits of expanded lunar exploration in an increasingly competitive field.
China's planned 53-day mission will see the Chang'E-6 lander land in an open crater on the far side of the moon, which never faces Earth. China became the first and only country to land on the far side of the moon during its 2019 Chang'E-4 mission.
Any far-side samples recovered by the Chang'E-6 probe could help scientists analyze the evolution of the moon and the solar system itself — and provide important data to advance China's lunar ambitions.
“Chang'E-6 aims to achieve breakthroughs in the design and control technology of the moon's retrograde orbit, intelligent sampling, takeoff and ascent technologies, and automatic sample return on the far side of the moon” Ge Ping, deputy director of the Center for Lunar Exploration and Space Engineering of the China National Space Administration (CNSA) said last week from the launch site.
Ambitious mission
The Chang'E-6 probe will be a key test of China's space capabilities as it strives to realize leader Xi Jinping's “eternal dream” of building the country into a space power.
China has made rapid space advances in recent years, in a field traditionally led by the United States and Russia.
With the Chang'e program, launched in 2007 and named after the moon goddess of Chinese mythology, China in 2013 became the first country to achieve a robotic lunar landing in nearly four decades. In 2022, China completed its own orbital space station, Tiangong.
The technically complex Chang'E-6 mission builds on Chang'E-4's 2019 record of landing on the far side of the moon, and Chang'E-5's 2020 success returning to Earth with moon samples. .
This time, to communicate with Earth on the other side of the moon, Chang'E-6 must rely on the Queqiao-2 satellite, launched into lunar orbit in March.
The probe itself is made up of four parts: an orbiter, a lander, an ascender and a reentry module.
The mission plan is for the Chang'E-6 lander to gather lunar dust and rocks after landing in the sprawling South Pole-Aitken basin, approximately 2,500 kilometers in diameter, a crater formed about 4 billion years ago. .
An ascending spacecraft then transports the samples to the lunar orbiter for transfer to the reentry module and the mission's return to Earth.
The complex mission “goes through virtually every step” that will be required for Chinese astronauts to land on the moon in the coming years, according to James Head, a professor emeritus at Brown University who collaborated with Chinese scientists leading the mission.
In addition to returning samples that could produce “fundamental new insights into the origin and early history of the moon and solar system,” the mission also serves as “practical robotics for these steps” to take astronauts to the moon and back, he said. .
China plans to launch two more missions in the Chang-e series as it approaches its 2030 goal of sending astronauts to the Moon before building a research station over the next decade at the lunar south pole – a region believed to contain ice. .
Chang'E-7, scheduled for 2026, will aim to search for resources at the moon's south pole, while Chang'E-8, approximately two years later, could seek to use lunar materials to prepare for construction of the research base, they said. Chinese authorities.
Competition in space
Friday's launch comes as several nations ramp up their lunar programs amid a growing focus on potential access to resources and access to deep space exploration that successful lunar missions could bring.
Last year, India landed its first spacecraft on the moon, while Russia's first lunar mission in decades ended in failure when its Luna 25 probe crashed into the moon's surface.
In January, Japan became the fifth country to land a spacecraft on the Moon, although its Moon Sniper lander faced power problems due to an incorrect landing angle. The following month, IM-1, a NASA-funded mission designed by Texas-based private company Intuitive Machines, touched down near the South Pole.
That landing — the first by a U.S. spacecraft in more than five decades — is among several commercial missions planned to explore the lunar surface before NASA attempts to return U.S. astronauts there in 2026 and build its scientific base camp.
NASA Administrator Bill Nelson last month appeared to recognize that China's pace — and concerns about its intentions — were driving American urgency to return to the Moon, decades after its manned Apollo missions.
“We believe that much of your so-called civilian space program is a military program. I think we're actually in a race,” Nelson told lawmakers last month, adding his concern that China might try to bar the U.S. or other countries from certain lunar areas if they get there first.
China has long said it advocates the peaceful use of space and, like the US, seeks to use its space prowess to cultivate international goodwill.
This time, China said the Chang'E-6 mission carries scientific instruments or payloads from France, Italy, Pakistan and the European Space Agency.
“China hopes to strengthen cooperation with its international counterparts and deepen international cooperation in the space field,” CNSA's Ge told reporters a day before the launch.
Source: CNN Brasil
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