China has created history today by becoming the third nation in the world to have retrieved rocks from the moon successfully. The Chang¡¯e-5 mission returned back to Earth last night with the samples, according to reports by Chinese news agencies.?
The capsule landed in Siziwang Banner, in the north of China¡¯s Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region. Named after the ancient Chinese goddess of the moon, the mission commenced from Wenchang Spacecraft Launch Site in Hainan on November 24.?
The mission entailed it to land on the near side of the moon on December 1, over a massive lava plain dubbed Oceanus Procellarum, also known as ¡®Ocean of Storms¡¯. This was also the third successful landing made by China on the lunar surface in a decade. The dark spot, according to NASA researchers, could be the outcome from a giant cosmic impact that formed an ancient sea of magma.?
Samples from this yet-to-be-discovered region could help scientists decode the origin of the moon and help create future space missions to other planets.?
The samples are scheduled to be sent to Beijing, where the samples will be analysed. Chinese space agency¡¯s deputy director, Pei Zhaoyu has also said that it will make some of the samples available to researchers around the world.?
Moreover, they¡¯re now gearing to work on a plan to construct a scientific research station on the lunar surface, "We hope to cooperate with other countries to build the international lunar scientific research station, which could provide a shared platform for lunar scientific exploration and technological experiments."
China became the third nation to successfully retrieve moon rock samples from the lunar surface, after the United States of America (where the Apollo mission sent 12 astronauts to the Moon, bringing back around 380 kilograms of moon rock) and the Soviet Union, which deployed robotic sample return missions in the 1970s.?