Beijing — China said it unfurled the country's red and gold flag on the far side of the moon for the first time before its lunar spacecraft launched part of the vehicle with rock and soil samples to bring back to Earth early Tuesday. The mission was hailed as a success in China, where it has made significant progress in its space program that aims to put a man on the moon before the end of 2010.
that much The Chang'e 6 probe was launched last month. And the lander touched down on the far side of the moon Sunday. The lift took off at 7:38 a.m. Beijing time Tuesday, burning its engines for about six minutes as it entered a preset orbit around the moon, according to the China National Space Administration.
The agency said the spacecraft withstood high-temperature tests on the lunar surface, and used both drilling and surface collection to acquire samples before storing them in containers inside the rover's ascenterator as planned.
The container will be transferred from the desert of China's Inner Mongolia region to a re-entry capsule scheduled to return to Earth around June 25.
Reuters/CCTV
The small flag, which the agency made from a special composite material, appears on a folding arm deployed from the side of the lunar module and was not deployed on lunar soil, according to a mission animation released by the agency.
“Mission accomplished!” Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying wrote of X, “This is an unprecedented feat in the history of human lunar exploration!”
Missions to the far side of the Moon are more difficult because they are not directed toward Earth. Relay satellites are needed to maintain communication. The terrain is also more rugged, with fewer flat areas for landing.
Xinhua said the probe's landing site was the South Pole-Aitken Basin, an impact crater that was created 4 billion years ago and is 8 miles deep and 1,500 miles in diameter.
Because it is the oldest and largest crater on the moon, it may provide the earliest information about it, Xinhua News Agency said. He added that the massive impact may have ejected material from deep beneath the surface.
This mission is the sixth mission of the Chang'e Lunar Exploration Program, named after the Chinese moon goddess. It is designed to be the second to retrieve samples, following Chang'e 5, which retrieved samples from nearby in 2020.
Tingshu Wang/Reuters
The lunar program is part of a growing rivalry with the United States, which is still a leader in space exploration, and other countries including Japan and India. China is currently three crew members It operates its own space station orbiting the Earth and aims to send astronauts to the moon by 2030. Three more Chinese lunar missions are planned over the next four years.
If China succeeds in landing on the moon, it will become the second country after the United States. The United States is planning to land astronauts back on the moon for the first time in more than 50 years, but NASA earlier this year pushed back its target date to 2026.