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China's lunar probe successfully lands on moon in historic mission

If the mission is completed as planned, it would make China the third nation to have retrieved lunar samples after the United States and the Soviet Union.

Reuters

The Long March-5 Y5 rocket, carrying the Chang'e-5 lunar probe, takes off from Wenchang Space Launch Center, in Wenchang, Hainan province, China on November 24, 2020.

China has successfully landed a spacecraft on the moon's surface in a historic mission to retrieve lunar surface samples, Chinese state media reported.

The Chang'e-5 spacecraft "landed on the near side of the moon late on Tuesday," the Xinhua report said, citing the China National Space Administration. The one-sentence report from the official China News Service gave no more details.

The unmanned mission, named after the mythical Chinese goddess of the moon, aims to collect lunar material to help scientists learn more about the moon's origins.

China launched its Chang'e-5 probe on November 24 from the tropical southern island of Hainan, adding to a string of increasingly bold missions by a Chinese space program that aims eventually to land a human on the moon.

If the mission is completed as planned, it would make China the third nation to have retrieved lunar samples after the United States and the Soviet Union.

Collecting lunar samples

The lander vehicle that touched down on the moon's surface was one of several spacecraft deployed by the Chang'e-5 probe.

Upon landing, the lander vehicle is supposed to drill into the ground with a robotic arm, then transfer its soil and rock samples to an ascender vehicle that would lift off and dock with an orbiting module.

The mission will attempt to collect 2 kilograms of samples in a previously unvisited area in a massive lava plain known as Oceanus Procellarum, or "Ocean of Storms."

State broadcaster CCTV said it would start collecting samples on the lunar surface in the next two days.

The samples would be transferred to a return capsule for the trip back to Earth, landing in China's Inner Mongolia region.

China made its first lunar landing in 2013. In January last year, the Chang'e-4 probe touched down on the far side of the moon, the first space probe from any nation to do so.