In December 2020, China gathered samples from the moon’s surface for the first time in 44 years. The mission, involving the Chang’e 5 spacecraft, reignited interest in lunar samples across the world. Now China is back with a new model – the Chang’e 6 – which has rounded the dark side of the moon and is headed back to Earth.
Source: Unsplash
The Chinese Space Race
China’s role in the first space race is often overshadowed. That’s for good reason – they didn’t reach the moon until 2013. Instead, China spent its 1960s testing missiles and advancing its satellite technology. They considered joining the fun, but political strife quickly put an end to their ambitions.
Now the USSR is gone and China is the second-largest world economy, with a culture that’s recognisable across the globe. Through companies like Alibaba or TikTok, China has redefined a lot of digital experiences for mankind. Meanwhile, symbols like the Chinese dragon or the lucky golden tiger are used far and wide, including as mascots for iGaming slots. The country’s ancient culture is typically celebrated through its depiction in media, best seen with the Fortune Tiger slot review. It’s just one example of a slot game themed around Chinese iconography, with many other examples scattered online. While some industries are enamoured with China’s past, the Chinese are looking to the future with multiple ongoing space programmes.
Out of the several programmes currently underway, it’s the Chinese Lunar Exploration Program that has made headlines. Using their Chang’e line of spacecraft (named after the country’s mythological moon goddess) they have made not one but two unmanned lunar landings since 2020. They have also promised to send a manned flight to the moon by 2030. This puts pressure on the US, who have 2026 plans to land humans at the moon’s South Pole and create a working base, as part of NASA’s Project Artemis. If the nations start competing with one another, we may see a sequel to the space race very soon.
Finishing Apollo’s Job
When the Apollo missions headed to the moon, they all landed on the side that faced them. That makes sense, but it also severely limited the knowledge gained from those projects. Both the Apollos and the USSR’s Luna 24 all landed on the same side. It would have been an understandable decision at the time – it was more efficient and easier to plan than curving around the moon.
NASA and the European Space Agency have had a lot of time to contemplate historical moon landings. Using old samples, they determined that the moon may have been subject to heavy asteroid bombardment some four billion years ago. Dubbed the lunar cataclysm or the late heavy bombardment, astronomers disagree over whether this event took place.
The dark side of the moon may have the answers, specifically at the South-Pole Aitken Basin. As one of the largest known impact craters ever discovered, some believe it’ll confirm or deny the bombardment thesis. China has already been there, having touched down using Chang’e 4 in 2019, but they didn’t get enough material for testing.
That’s where Chang’e 6 comes in. This new spacecraft launched on the 3rd of May, to gather 4.4 lbs of material from the Aitken Basin. About a month later, Chinese media announced that the craft had landed without issue and started harvesting its rock collection. Now it’s on its way back to Earth, estimated to be the 25th of June.
