Unmanned mission to Mars
WENCHANG, China - China successfully launched an unmanned probe to Mars on Thursday in its first independent mission to another planet, in a display of its technological prowess and ambition to join an elite club of space-faring nations.
China’s largest carrier rocket, the Long March 5 Y-4, blasted off with the probe at 12:41pm (0441 GMT) from Wenchang Space Launch Centre on the southern island of Hainan.
In 2020, Mars is at its closest to Earth, at a distance of about 55 million km (34 million miles), in a window of about a month that opens once every 26 months.