China wants to be the first space program to send a lunar probe to the dark side of the moon, and it wants to accomplish the feat within the next five years, Chinese Academy of Sciences officials reportedly said in an interview with state broadcast outlet CCTV on Wednesday.
According to the Associated Press (AP), engineer Zou Yongliao said that the proposed Chang’e 4 mission would launch sometime before 2020 and would analyze geological conditions on the far side of the moon. That could lead to the placement of a radio telescope which could help “fill a void” in astronomers’ knowledge of the universe, Zou added.
While probes have explored the surface of the moon’s dark side, no space agency has ever tried to land there, according to CNN.com. Radio transmissions from Earth cannot reach the far side, the AP noted, making it an ideal location for potentially sensitive instruments.
China’s next lunar mission is currently scheduled to launch in 2017, and will involve attempting to land a spaceship on the moon. That spacecraft would collect samples and return to Earth, and if successful, it would make China just the third country to have completed such a mission.
Chang’e 5 spacecraft set to launch before Chang’e 4
Thus far, China’s Chang’e lunar exploration program has already launched a pair of orbiting probes, the AP said, and in 2013 it landed a vehicle with an onboard rover on the lunar surface. Officials there have also reportedly hinted at a possible manned mission to the moon.
In May, Wu Weiren, the chief engineer for China’s Lunar Exploration Program, told CCTV that China planned to send the Chang’e 4 spacecraft to orbit the moon before sending a rover to the surface, CNN.com said. Wu explained that his team would “choose a site” that is “more difficult to land and more technically challenging,” and that their “next move” would “probably see some spacecraft land on the far side of the moon.”
The website also said that China plans to launch its Chang’e 5 spacecraft before the Chang’e 4, with the higher-numbered probe launching in 2017. It will orbit and land on the moon, dig and collect rock samples from up to two meters beneath the moon’s surface, then return to Earth. It will be launched from the new Wenchang Satellite Launch Center in Hainan.
China released detailed images of the proposed Chang’e 5 landing site last week – images that were captured from an orbiting service module some 19 miles (30 kilometers) from the moon, according to CNN. Those pictures had a resolution of one meter, officials from the China State Administration of Science, Technology and Industry for National Defence noted.
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Feature Image: Thinkstock
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