China's Chang'e-6 lunar probe has completed a groundbreaking mission by successfully taking off from the far side of the moon. This marks the first time a spacecraft has lifted off from the moon's dark side, a region that permanently faces away from Earth. The mission, which began on May 3, 2024, and lasted 53 days, involved collecting rock and soil samples from the South Pole-Aitken Basin, one of the largest impact craters in the solar system.
The China National Space Administration (CNSA) confirmed that the ascender module of the Chang'e-6 probe has entered a preset lunar orbit, beginning its journey back to Earth. The return trip is expected to take approximately three weeks, with the landing projected in Inner Mongolia around June 25, 2024. This mission aims to provide crucial insights into the moon's formation and evolutionary history, with potential implications for understanding the origin of the solar system.
In a symbolic act, the Chang'e-6 mission unfurled a Chinese national flag on the moon's far side, using a robotic arm. The flag, made of basalt fibers, was designed to withstand extreme lunar conditions. This is the second time China has collected lunar samples, following the Chang'e-5 mission in 2020. The successful completion of the Chang'e-6 mission underscores China's rapid advancements in space exploration and its ambitions to establish a lunar base and send a crewed mission to the moon by 2030.
Concurrent with China's progress, other nations are also enhancing their lunar exploration efforts. The United States, under NASA's Artemis program, plans to return to the moon with human astronauts by 2026. India's recent lunar landing and Japan's Moon Sniper mission signify a competitive landscape in lunar exploration, aiming to secure resources and further deep-space research.