China successfully blasts off to the Moon – but what is the plan when it lands?
The mission is a big leap forward.
China has successfully blasted off to the Moon again, with the growing space superpower aiming to add yet another complex technical mission to its list of achievements.
Having only first put an astronaut – or taikonaut – in space in 2003, in the two decades since, its capabilities have developed at near light speed.
The nation now has a manned space station, a Mars rover, and was the first country to land on the far side of the Moon.
Five years on, it is bidding to repeat the feat with Chang’e 6, a mission to return rock and soil samples from the lunar surface on the ‘dark’ side.
The probe is being carried on a Long March-5 YB rocket set for lift-off on Friday evening local time – Friday morning in the UK – from the Wenchang launch centre on the southern tropical island province of Hainan.
In 2020, China became the first country to return samples from the Moon’s near side since the US Apollo missions in the 1960s and 1970s. Analysis of the samples found they contained water in tiny beads embedded in lunar dirt, offering hope for future longer-term missions, and the ability to use the Moon as a launchpad for further space exploration.
Chang’e 6 will land in the south pole’s Aitken Basin, the Moon’s largest and oldest impact crater. Material brought back by the spacecraft could help scientists understand more about what was going on in the solar system billions of years ago.
That is not the only reason the far side of the Moon has long fascinated scientists however. Because it is permanently facing away from Earth, it also provides an ideal spot for radio astronomy, looking out into the cosmos without the noise created by eight billion humans’ technology getting in the way.
However, the 53-day Chang’e 6 mission is not only important for science. It will also prove the country’s ability to lift off from the far side of the Moon, a difficult task requiring a relay satellite to bounce signals from Earth back towards the craft, which has already been launched.
What does Chang’e mean?
Chang’e, the name of China’s lunar space programme, is named after the Chinese goddess of the Moon.
She fled to the Moon when her husband Hou Yi, the great archer, discovered she had stolen the immortal elixir of life given to him by the gods.
Originally known as Hang’e, she was renamed to avoid sharing a name with the emperor Liu Heng, which is considered taboo.
Success will mark a major step towards China’s goal of landing boots on the Moon by 2030, with hopes for a permanently manned base in the future.
It is this ambition, combined with the country’s rapid expansion of its space capabilities, that prompted Nasa boss Bill Nelson to warn China could attempt to take over parts of the Moon within a few years.
Speaking before a House Appropriations Committee, Mr Nelson said he fears the country’s civilian programmes launched in the name of science could actually be secret military operations.
‘China has made extraordinary strides, especially in the last 10 years, but they are very, very secretive,’ he said. ‘We believe that a lot of their so-called civilian space programme is a military programme. And I think, in effect, we are in a race.
‘Their latest date that they have said that they’re going to land [on the Moon] is 2030, but that keeps moving up.
‘My concern would be if China got there first and suddenly said “okay, this is our territory you stay out”.
‘Obviously you don’t want to interfere with each other, but don’t go in and declare that this whole territory is suddenly yours.’
However, Beijing has said it remains committed to working alongside other nations to build a ‘shared’ future.
Who owns the Moon?
The Outer Space Treaty states that the exploration and use of space shall be carried out in the interests of all countries – that includes the Moon.
That means no one nation can ‘own’ the Moon, or any part of it, regardless of where they plant flags or build bases.
However, not everyone has signed the Treaty – while China is a signatory, Russia is not.
And as the countries and companies begin to explore mining the Moon, deciding who can dig where and could become a source of international tension in years to come.
Chang’e 7, due for launch in 2026, will survey the lunar south pole for water, while Chang’e 8, two years later, will be used to assess where in the region could be suitable to build future infrastructure.
Chang’e-6 will carry payloads from France, Italy, Sweden and Pakistan, while Chang’e-7 will include payloads from Russia, Switzerland and Thailand.
Nasa is banned by US law from any collaboration, direct or indirect, with China. It is this law that pushed China to build its own space station, and with the International Space Station due to be decommissioned by the end of this decade, it could soon be the only country with a manned base in orbit.
The US is aiming to return astronauts to the Moon in 2026.