HELSINKI – Material from the far side of the moon has begun its journey to Earth after Chinese spacecraft collected samples and launched them into lunar orbit.
The Chang’e-6 mission’s ascent vehicle lifted off from atop the mission lander in the Apollo crater at 7:38 PM on June 3 (2338 UTC), the China National Space Administration (CNSA) announced. The ascender now follows the Chang’e-6 orbiter into a retrograde low lunar orbit.
Chang’e-6 landed on the far side of the moon in late June and soon after began collecting rock and regolith samples with a shovel and drill. A maximum of 2,000 grams was then loaded into the ascending vehicle.
“The packaging work has been completed under normal conditions and the whole process is running smoothly,” Li Xiaoyu, an engineer from the Beijing Aerospace Control Center (BACC), told CCTV.
The ascent vehicle took off and achieved autonomous positioning and attitude determination using the Queqiao-2 relay satellite.
The successful sampling and ascent operations are crucial steps in the complex four-spacecraft mission to bring unique and scientifically valuable samples to Earth from the far side of the moon.
The ascent vehicle is expected to rendezvous and dock with the mission’s service module in the coming days. Both spacecraft will reach a speed of approximately 1.6 kilometers per second during the maneuvers.
After docking, the sample canisters are transferred to a re-feed module via an automated process. The ascent vehicle is then discarded while the service module waits a calculated time to begin its return to Earth. This is expected around June 20-21, with the return module landing in Inner Mongolia around June 25, Beijing time.
China has not published a planned timing for milestones, but the mission will proceed similarly to the 2020 Chang’e-5 nearside sample return mission. Chinese space officials have previously indicated the mission would last 53 days.
Boost for lunar and deep space plans
The launch from the lunar surface and expected rendezvous and docking in lunar orbit will apply to China’s plan to land astronauts on the moon and return them safely to Earth before 2030. The sampling will also be useful for deep space efforts such as the upcoming Tianwen-2 asteroid and comet mission. China also plans to launch the Tianwen-3 Mars sample return mission around 2030.
“The mission is quite tough,” Ge Ping, spokesman for Chang’e-6 and deputy director of the Lunar Exploration and Space Engineering Center under CNSA, told CCTV about Chang’e-6. “We launched the Queqiao-2 relay satellite at an early stage and adopted technologies for rapid intelligent sampling and take-off and take-off from the lunar surface, which have laid a solid foundation for technologies such as soft landing and sampling on extraterrestrial bodies. ”
Queqiao-2 was launched in March and entered a specialized orbit around the moon. From there, it facilitates communication with the far side of the moon, which always faces away from Earth.
Chang’e-6, a roughly 8.2-ton stack of four spacecraft, was launched from Wenchang Spaceport on May 3. About 4.5 days later it entered lunar orbit. The approximately 3.2-ton mission lander successfully landed on the moon at 6:23 p.m. on June 1. The lander targeted a southern part of Apollo, a mid-latitude crater in the vast and scientifically intriguing South Pole-Aitken (SPA) basin. .
The Chang’e-6 lander also released a small rover that imaged the main spacecraft. Drive tracks can be seen in the lunar regolith. The image shows the lander and its solar panels, a deployed scoop arm. A Chinese national flag is also visible, which was deployed after the sample collection was completed. The ascent vehicle sits on top of the lander. A panoramic camera also captured the lander’s surroundings.
International cargoes, future missions
The French space agency also announced that its DORN payload to detect radon outgassing was successfully turned on and collecting data. The payload was disabled prior to the launch of the ascent vehicle. The lander also carries the Negative Ions at the Lunar Surface (NILS) payload, developed by the Swedish Institute for Space Physics, which CNSA has confirmed is enabled. An Italian passive laser retroreflector is also on board the lander.
Samples may contain material ejected from deep beneath the moon’s crust. This and other material could provide insight into why the near and far sides are so different, as well as clues about the history of the early solar system.
Chang’e-6 is part of China’s broader moon program. The country will follow up with two missions to the moon’s south pole. These are Chang’e-7 in 2026 and Chang’e-8 around 2028. The country aims to launch its first manned lunar mission in 2030.
Both sets of missions are part of a plan to establish a permanent lunar base. This project is known as the International Lunar Research Station (ILRS) program, planned for the 2030s. A number of countries and organizations have joined the project.
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