China lands rover on Mars
Another major feat for country’s aim at rivaling NASA
China successfully landed a rover-carrying spacecraft on Mars for the first time, state-run media reported Saturday, marking another major victory for the country’s ambitious space program that aims to rival NASA.
China now joins the United States as the only other nation to have successfully landed and operated rovers on Mars. Chinese President Xi Jinping hailed a “milestone” achievement.
The Tianwen-1 spacecraft, launched from the Chinese province of Hainan in July, has been orbiting Mars since February while looking for potential landing sites. Early
Saturday, it released an entry capsule containing a lander and a rover that began to plummet through the Mars atmosphere, according to staterun Xinhua News Agency.
The entry capsule safely touched down in a flat plane on Mars’ surface at 7:18 p.m. Friday, though it took about an hour for ground controllers to determine that the mission had been a success, state media reported. During the perilous journey through Mars’ atmosphere, the craft had to operate autonomously, and signals could not be transmitted back to ground control until the robotic rover had landed and unfolded its solar panels and antenna.
While China has landed craft on the moon before — including the first probe to touch down on the far side of the moon in January 2019 — the Mars mission represents a significant leap and showcases Beijing’s huge investments in its space program. The United States has managed just nine successful Mars landings in the course of more than four decades, and the Soviet Union landed a probe on the planet in 1971 only to immediately lose contact.
“The motherland and people will always remember your outstanding feats!” Xi said in a congratulatory message to the Tianwen-1 mission team on Saturday.
The rover will spend the next three months studying the surface of Mars for signs of water or ice that could point to the planet’s ability to sustain life.
NASA’S Perseverance rover mission, which is also looking for evidence of life on Mars, landed on the Red Planet in February.