China Aims Straight for the Moon
As people around the world were celebrating the 50th anniversary of Apollo 11, the China National Space Administration (CNSA) reached a different kind of milestone. The China Lunar Exploration Program (CLEP) was examined by researchers, producing a encouraging report on the exploration of space by that nation since 2007.
This study, a clean bill of health for 30-year plan for the future of China in space, was profiled in a new journal article, published in Science. Their 30-year plan to explore the Moon, if successful, would make China a world leader in space exploration.
In a first-of-a-kind mission, the Chang’E-4, accompanied by the Yutu 2 rover, landed on the far side of the Moon on January 3, 2019. This pair of spacecraft created 3-D Moon maps in unprecedented detail, and discovered mantle material from beneath the crust deposited on the lunar surface. This finding could provide details of massive impacts from objects in the ancient past.
“Fifty years after Neil Armstrong took, ‘one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind’ as the first human to set foot on the Moon, China’s CE-4 lander and Yutu 2 rover left the footprints of humanity’s first robotic visit to the surface of the far side of the Moon,” said LI Chunlai, Deputy Director-General of National Astronomical Observatories of the Chinese Academies of Science (NAOC).
