[ad_1]
Two days after landing on the Moon, China’s Chang’e-5 mission is on its way again, returning to space, the start of its return journey to Earth carrying an abundance of soil and rocks for the Earth to study. scientists.
The top half of the lander was launched at 10:10 a.m. EDT on Thursday, according to China’s National Space Administration. Images released by Chinese state media showed the spacecraft’s engine flash as it made its way into orbit, an ascent that took about six minutes.
It was the first time that a spacecraft had been launched from the lunar surface since the Cold War lunar race ended in 1976, and the first Chinese spacecraft to take off from another world in the solar system.
The lander touched down in an area of the moon known as Mons Rümker on Tuesday. The spacecraft was in the middle of a basalt lava plain about two billion years younger than parts of the moon explored more than four decades ago by NASA’s Apollo astronauts and robotic landers Luna of the Soviet Union. Images of the spaceship show a desolate landscape with gentle rolling hills, a sign of its youth.
Within hours of arriving on the moon, Chang’e-5 set out to drill and collect his lunar samples – perhaps more than four pounds.
Scientists are curious as to how this region remained molten for much longer than the rest of the moon. Examining these rocks in laboratories on Earth will also determine their exact age, which will calibrate a method that planetary scientists use to determine the age of surfaces of planets, moons, and other bodies throughout the system. solar.
The departure of the spacecraft is the first step in a complex sequence to bring the rocks back to Earth.
After arriving in lunar orbit this weekend, Chang’e-5 split in two. As the lander made its way to the surface, the other half remained in orbit.
The ascending part of the lander is at the rendezvous and docking with the part remained in orbit. Rocks and soil will be transferred to a return capsule for a return trip to Earth, parachuting to a landing in Inner Mongolia later this month.
[ad_2]
Source link