At 17:27 on May 3rd Friday 2024 Beijing time CNSA –China National Space Administration, the Chang’e-6 probe was successfully launched by the Long March 5 Yao-8 carrier rocket from the Wenchang Space Launch Site in Hainan Province, China, People’s Republic of China., and accurately entered the Earth-moon transfer orbit. The launch mission was a complete success. The Chang’e-6 probe has embarked on the world’s first return journey for sampling from the far side of the moon. The pre-selected landing and sampling area is the South Pole-Aitken Basin on the far side of the moon.
[ Chang’e 6 completes sampling and ascender takes off from the far side of the moon and enters the scheduled lunar orbit]
According to the National Space Administration, at 7:38 today, the Chang’e 6 ascender carrying lunar samples took off from the far side of the moon. After the 3000N engine worked for about 6 minutes, it successfully sent the ascender into the scheduled lunar orbit.
From June 2 to 3, Chang’e 6 successfully completed intelligent and rapid sampling in the South Pole-Aitken Basin on the far side of the moon, and packaged the precious lunar far side samples in the storage device carried by the ascender in a predetermined form. During the sampling and packaging process, researchers simulated the geographical model of the sampling area and simulated sampling in the ground laboratory based on the probe data transmitted back by the Queqiao-2 relay satellite, providing important support for sampling decisions and operations in various links.
Intelligent sampling is one of the core key links of the Chang’e 6 mission. The probe withstood the high temperature test on the far side of the moon, and collected lunar samples by drilling with a drill and taking samples from the surface with a robotic arm, realizing multi-point and diversified automatic sampling.
嫦娥六号 The lander and ascender took a group photo] On June 3, 2024, the “mobile camera” carried by Chang’e 6 moved autonomously and successfully took and sent back a group photo of the lander and ascender
The Chang’e-6 lander was equipped with a landing camera, panoramic camera, lunar soil structure detector, lunar mineral spectrometer and other payloads that were powered on normally and carried out scientific exploration as planned, playing an important role in scientific exploration tasks such as lunar surface morphology and mineral composition detection and research, lunar shallow structure detection, etc. Before the probe drilled and sampled, the lunar soil structure detector analyzed and judged the underground lunar soil structure in the sampling area, providing data reference for sampling. The international payloads
carried by the Chang’e-6 lander, such as the European Space Agency’s lunar surface negative ion analyzer and the French lunar radon gas detector, worked normally and carried out corresponding scientific exploration tasks. Among them, the French lunar radon gas detector was powered on during the Earth-Moon transfer, lunar orbit phase and lunar surface working phase; the European Space Agency’s lunar surface negative ion analyzer was powered on during the lunar surface working phase. The Italian laser corner reflector installed on the top of the lander became a position control point that can be used for distance measurement on the back side of the moon.
After the surface sampling was completed, the five-star red flag carried by the Chang’e-6 lander was successfully unfolded on the back side of the moon. This is the first time that China has independently and dynamically displayed its national flag on the back side of the moon. The national flag is made of new composite materials and special technology. Due to the different landing position on the moon, the Chang’e 6 national flag display system has been adaptively improved on the basis of the Chang’e 5 mission.
Images and visuals are from their Respectives CMS China Manned SpaceCNSA-China National Space Administration