The next phase of China’s moon program begins with the launch on Monday of a new data relay satellite to link lunar landers and rovers on the moon’s far side with ground controllers on Earth.
The launch, scheduled for around 8:31 p.m. EDT (00:31 UTC), will send China’s Queqiao-2 relay spacecraft toward the moon, where it will enter an elliptical orbit and enter China’s next position in preparation for the arrival of the robotic lunar lander. Sixth year of Chang’e, later this year.
The medium-lift Long March 8 rocket is scheduled to launch the Queqiao-2 spacecraft from Wenchang Launch Base on Hainan Island in southern China. This will be the third flight of the Long March 8, which will be powered by kerosene. The Long March 8 is one of China’s new generation rockets designed to replace older Long March launcher designs that burn toxic propellants.
If all goes according to plan, Long March 8’s upper stage will deploy the Queqiao-2 spacecraft within an hour of liftoff. Queqiao-2 then deploys its solar panels and fires a series of thrusters to guide it into orbit around the moon.
Queqiao-2 will be in a stable “frozen” orbit around the Moon, minimizing fuel consumption during the mission. The orientation of Queqiao-2’s elongated orbit will allow the spacecraft to loiter for hours over the landing site chosen by Chinese authorities for the country’s next series of robotic moon explorations.
Two small satellites are also flying to the moon aboard the Long March 8 rocket. One of these spaceships is the size of a kitchen oven, and the other is the size of a small suitcase. The Tiandu-1 and Tiandu-2 satellites will jointly conduct inter-satellite ranging tests and verify orbit determination technology. The results of these tests will provide information to Chinese engineers. Constellation of data relay satellites and navigation satellites It’s like a lunar GPS and could be in use within the next decade.
far side operations
Chang’e 6, scheduled to launch in May on a Long March 5 rocket, will be China’s first lunar lander to use a new data relay satellite. Chang’e 6 will aim to land on the moon, collect samples and return to Earth, repeating the feat China achieved with the Chang’e 5 sample return mission in 2020.
However, Chang’e 5 landed on the far side of the moon and provided line-of-sight communications directly to Earth. China’s goal with Chang’e 6 is to collect the first rocks from the far side of the moon and bring them back for detailed examination at a laboratory on Earth. If successful, Chang’e 6 will be the first mission to return samples from the far side of the moon, adding a new type of specimen to humanity’s inventory of lunar rocks.
In 2019, China achieved the first soft landing on the far side of the moon with the Chang’e 4 mission, which is itself a near-replicate of Chang’e 3, which landed on the near side of the moon in 2013. The Chang’e 6 spacecraft serves as a backup for the Chang’e 5.
When it landed in 2019, China’s Chang’e 4 mission used an earlier data relay satellite, Queqiao-1, launched in May 2018. Weighing more than 2,600 pounds (1.2 tons) when fully loaded with launch fuel, Queqiao-2 is larger. The spacecraft is more than twice the mass of China’s first lunar communications relay station.