China has moved to become the first country on Earth to retrieve samples from moon’s previously unexplored areas using an unmanned spacecraft.
At 4:00 p.m. local time on Friday (4:00 a.m. ET), a Long March 5 rocket carrying the 8.2-ton Chang’e 6 spacecraft is expected to take off from the nation’s southernmost spaceport, the Wenchang Space Launch Site on the subtropical island of Hainan.
It is expected that the probe will land in the Apollo crater on the moon’s larger South Pole-Aitkin basin.
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The spacecraft was first built as a fallback for China‘s lunar expedition scheduled for 2020.
After more than double the duration of its predecessor, Chang’e 6 is scheduled to return in 53 days carrying more than two kilograms (4.4 pounds) of samples from the moon’s obscured side.
According to Wang Qiong, deputy chief designer of state broadcaster China Central Television, Chang’e 6 aims to update China’s scientific knowledge of the moon by systematically studying the composition, structure, and physical properties of lunar soil on the moon’s far side over an extended period of time.
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