China’s Chang’e 4 mission goals accomplished; first panorama photograph of far side of moon revealed
- ‘Selfie’ marks giant leap for moon mission before information gathering begins
- China and partners in US, Russia, Sweden, German and the Netherlands go to work
Chang’e 4, China’s lunar mission, was declared a success on Friday, the China National Space Agency said.
The lander and its rover, Yutu 2, took a picture of each other and sent them back to Earth via Queqiao, the relay satellite over the far side of the moon, to market the occasion.
Devices aboard the spacecraft which will carry out scientific research on the moon and monitor radio waves from across the cosmos began operations, while the data they have collected so far reached the control centre as intended, suggesting the mission has achieved its goals.
The moon mission’s cosmic “selfie” on Friday was preceded on Thursday by the first panorama photo of the moon’s far side. Chang’e 4 put the payloads supplied by China’s science partners to work that day. One of those partners is Nasa, the US space agency.
Nasa continued its long cooperation with the China National Space Agency even as Washington and Beijing went toe-to-toe over tariffs in a battle that has been on hold for nearly 50 days to allow diplomats to seek an agreement.
