China prepares mission to land craft on moon

China was preparing to launch a ground-breaking mission early on Saturday to softland a spacecraft on the largely unexplored far side of the moon, demonstrating its growing ambitions as a space power to rival Russia, the EU and US.

With its Chang’e 4 mission, China hopes to be the first country to ever successfully undertake such a landing.

The moon’s far side is also known as the dark side because it faces away from Earth and remains comparatively unknown, with a different composition from sites on the near side, where previous missions have landed.

If successful, the mission scheduled to blast off aboard a Long March 3B rocket will propel the Chinese space program to a leading position in one of the most important areas of lunar exploration.

BEIJING: