China’s space agency has just released new photos of their lunar rover that started to leave tracks in the surface of the lunar soil. It is the beginning of a historic mission, where the first human-made object has successfully landed on the far side of the moon, also known as the “dark side.”
The First Mission of Its Kind
It is the first mission ever to have accomplished a successful landing, and now Chang’e 4 has released a rover called Yutu 2 to move on the lunar surface. Here are some photos of the rover leaving tracks as it gets farther from the craft. One of the photographs shows the rover at the end of the ramp, and the other one shows Yutu 2 in the distance.
This mission has just begun, and China aims to learn more about the uncharted and unseen side of the moon while competing with US and Russia in the space race.
The China National Space Administration has released photos of the crater where Chang’e 4 has landed, and you can check a close-up image in this article.
Yutu 2 is also known as Jade Rabbit 2, and it has six powered wheels, it can reach 0.1 mph and climb a hill with an incline of 20 degrees, or mount an obstacle that is as tall as 8 inches, says a report from The Associated Press.
According to the report, Shen Zhenrong of the China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation, the designer of the rover, explained that the dark side of the moon is “soft” and it is as if “you are walking on the snow.” This is why China made a soft landing so that they don’t damage the surface.
In an interview with the press, the chief designer of the Lunar Exploration Project Wu Weiren concluded that the mission was “a small step for the rover, but one giant leap for the Chinese nation.”
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