Technologies at the Beijing Aerospace Control Center on Sunday oversee the docking of the Chang “E5 lunar probe climber with its orbiter-rentry capsule combination. Jin Liwang / XINHUA
The lunar samples collected by China’s Chang’e 5 robotic probe will soon begin their journey to Earth, according to the China National Space Administration.
The silver rocks and dust have been delivered to their final host from the well of Changa 5 – the probe’s rentry capsule, which will later bring them to Earth.
-300 metric tons of Orbiter-Rentry capsules docked with the mixture early Sunday morning and then transferred to a capsule containing 3 kilograms of lunar specimens in a sealed container.
Parashan was the first automatic rendering and docking of any spacecraft in lunar orbit.
During the final Apollo mission, two components of the spacecraft docked in lunar orbit in December 1972, and were observed and observed by astronauts.
One of the most crucial devices during a very sophisticated docking maneuver on Sunday morning, the microwave radar, mounted on an orbiter, worked with its transponder to measure rapidly changing distances and provide communication between the two traveling vehicles. To adjust their position during the King.
The instruments were designed and manufactured by engineers from the 25th Institute of China Aerospace Science and Industry Corp. Second Academy. Sun Wu, chief designer of equipment at the institute, said they used many advanced technologies in the device, making them the best of their kind in the world.
A few hours after docking, the ascending departed the orbiter-rentry capsule compound around noon, while the compound continued its lunar orbit before its journey to Earth, the space administration said in a statement Sunday afternoon.
Once in Earth orbit, the pair will separate in due course, and the Rintry capsule will perform a series of complex maneuvers to return to the preset landing site in the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region of northern China in mid-December.
Chang 5, China’s largest and most sophisticated lunar probe, has four main components – an orbiter, a lander, an ascending and a rentary capsule. The spacecraft was launched on March 24 at the Venchang Space Launch Center in Henan Province by a heavy-lift carrier rocket, launching China’s most challenging lunar adventure since 1976 and the world’s first mission to bring lunar samples to Earth. .
When the moon was in orbit on November 30, the probe was divided into two parts – the Orbiter-Rentry Capsule compound and the Lander-Ascender compound.
The Lander-Asander mixture landed on the moon on Tuesday, becoming the world’s third spacecraft to land on the lunar surface in this century after its predecessor – Changi 3 and 4 – shortly after landing, it began using an exercise to obtain samples 2 meters below the lunar surface. For.
He completed the underground operation on Wednesday morning, and then began using a mechanical hand to recover the surface dirt.
All storage and packing procedures were completed Wednesday night, much earlier than expected. The samples were packed in a vacuum container inside the climber.
The climber on Thursday night activated the engine to land in an elliptical lunar orbit to prepare itself for docking from the Rentry Capsule, marking the first time a Chinese spacecraft had been blown out of an outer world body.
If the mission succeeds, it will make China the third country, after the United States and the former Soviet Union, to return samples from the moon.
U.S. A total of 382 kilograms of lunar rocks and dust were found between 1969 and 1976 by Apollo mission astronauts and Soviet Luna robotic landers.
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