China launches Chang’e-6 to retrieve samples from the far side of the moon

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Wenchang, Hainan, May 4 (Xinhua/GNA) — A Long March-5 rocket carrying the Chang’e-6 spacecraft was launched from its launch pad at the Wenchang Space Launch Site on the coast of the Southern Island Province Hainan in China. Friday afternoon.

The Chang’e-6 mission is tasked with collecting and returning samples from the mysterious far side of the moon, the first attempt of its kind in the history of human lunar exploration.

“Collecting and returning samples from the far side of the moon is an unprecedented achievement. Now we know very little about the far side of the moon. If the Chang’e-6 mission can achieve its goal, it will provide scientists with the first direct evidence to understand the environment and material composition of the far side of the moon, which is of great significance,” said Wu Weiren, an academic. from the Chinese Academy of Engineering and chief designer of China’s lunar exploration program.

The Chang’e-6 spacecraft, like its predecessor Chang’e-5, consists of an orbiter, a lander, a riser and a returner.

After it reaches the moon, it will make a soft landing on the other side. Within 48 hours of landing, a robotic arm will be extended to scoop rocks and soil from the moon’s surface, and a drill will drill into the ground. At the same time, scientific detection work will be carried out.

After the samples are sealed in a container, the lunar ascender will lift off and dock with the orbiter in lunar orbit. The returnee will then bring the samples back to Earth, landing in the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region in northern China. The entire flight is expected to last about 53 days, the China National Space Administration said.

Since the moon’s revolution cycle is the same as its rotation cycle, the same side always faces Earth. The other face, most of which cannot be seen from Earth, is called the far side or “dark side” of the moon. This term does not refer to visible darkness, but rather to the mystery that shrouds the moon’s largely unexplored terrain.

Remote sensing images show that the two sides of the moon are very different. The near side is relatively flat, while the far side is densely littered with impact craters of varying sizes and has far fewer lunar mares than the near side. Scientists conclude that the moon’s crust on the far side is much thicker than that on the near side. But why that is the case remains a mystery.

An impact crater known as the Apollo Basin, located in the South Pole-Aitken (SPA) basin on the far side of the moon, has been chosen as the main landing and sampling site for the Chang’e-6 mission. Wang Qiong, deputy chief designer of the Chang’e-6 mission.

The colossal SPA basin was formed by a collision in the sky more than 4 billion years ago and has a diameter of 2,500 kilometers, equivalent to the distance from Beijing to Hainan, and a depth of about 13 kilometers. It is the oldest and largest impact crater on the moon and in the solar system, and scientists say it could provide the earliest information about the moon.

“First-hand direct samples from the far side of the moon are essential to give us a deeper understanding of the features and differences of the two sides of the moon, and to reveal the moon’s secrets,” said Zeng Xingguo , a scientist at the National Astronomical Observatories of the Chinese Academy of Sciences.

“The entire mission is fraught with countless challenges, with each step interconnected and nerve-wracking,” Wang said.

To establish communications between Earth and the probe on the far side of the moon, earlier this year China sent the Queqiao-2 relay satellite, whose name translates to ‘magpie bridge-2’, into a highly elliptical frozen orbit around the moon.

Although the Chang’e-4 mission achieved the world’s first soft landing on the far side of the moon in 2019, Chang’e-6 still faces significant risks as the rugged terrain on the far side of the moon poses major challenges entails for landing, space travel and space travel. experts say.

The Chang’e-6 mission should see new technological breakthroughs in areas such as the design and control of the lunar retrograde orbit, rapid intelligent sampling and takeoff from the far side of the moon, Wang said.

“The amount of samples Chang’e-6 can collect is uncertain and cannot be accurately estimated at this time. Our goal is to collect 2 kilograms,” said Deng Xiangjin, a space expert from the China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation.

The Chang’e-6 mission carries four payloads developed through international cooperation. Scientific instruments from France, Italy and the European Space Agency/Sweden are on board the Chang’e-6 lander, and a small satellite from Pakistan is on board the orbiter.

GNA/Credit: Xinhua