The Chinese Chang’e-6 probe reaches the dark side of the Moon; this is your mission

Chang’e-6 carries out a technically complex 53-day mission that began on May 3. On Sunday it descended from its orbit to about 200 kilometers above the Moon to search for a lunar landing site, Huang Wu of the China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation told state television. CCTV.

Descent to a lower orbit “had some risks, so we used precise control procedures to place (the probe) on its set trajectory,” Huang said.

Subsequently, “we had to reduce the relative speed of the probe towards the Moon (…) to zero in 15 minutes,” he indicated.

Now that the moon has landed, It will try to collect lunar dust and rocks, as well as carry out other experiments nearby. The process should be completed in two days, Xinhua said.

The probe will employ two collection methods: a drill to collect samples below the surface and a robotic arm to take samples above the surface. Later he must attempt an unprecedented launch from the dark side of the Moon.

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Scientists say that this area – so called because it is not visible from Earth – It has great potential for research because its craters are less covered by ancient lava flows on the visible side of the satellite. Material collected from the dark side may provide insight into how the Moon formed

China had already placed a spacecraft on the far side of the Moon in 2019, but did not collect any samples.

Under President Xi Jinping, China has strongly pushed its “space dream.” Beijing has invested considerable resources in its space program over the last decade, aiming for a series of ambitious initiatives aimed at bridging the gap with the two traditional space powers: the United States and Russia. And he achieved several notable achievements, including the construction of the Tiangong, or ‘heavenly palace’, space station.

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China also sent robotic probes to Mars and the Moon and is only the third country to place humans in orbit. But Washington warned that the Chinese space program has been used to conceal military objectives and an effort to achieve space dominance.

“We believe that much of your so-called civilian space program is a military program,” the head of the US space agency NASA, Bill Nelson, told lawmakers at the US Capitol in April.

China aims to send a manned mission to the Moon by 2030 and plans to build a base on the satellite’s surface. The United States also plans to send astronauts to the Moon again by 2026, with its Artemis 3 mission.