Aiming to achieve “orbiting, landing and roving” all in one mission, China's Tianwen-1 probe, which managed to smoothly reach Martian parking orbit in February, has entered crucial touchdown stage.
China Will Land a Rover on Mars: How to Watch
China’s Tianwen-1 mission, orbiting the red planet since February, is expected to attempt a difficult landing of the Zhurong rover soon.
An artist’s concept of the Chinese lunar probe and lander released by the Chinese state space agency in 2016.Credit.Xinhua, via Associated Press
May 14, 2021Updated 4:46 p.m. ET
China has sent astronauts to space. Its robotic probes have been to the moon and back. On Saturday (it will still be Friday in the United States) it will attempt a landing on Mars, a difficult operation that has ended in fiery failure many times for space programs that have tried it.
This undated file photo shows an illustration of Tianwen-1 robotic probe entering Martian orbit. - China Daily
BEIJING (Global Times): In the wake of China s successful launch of the Tianhe core cabin, the first section for the country s first space station, into planned orbit, stargazers from all over the world have now turned their heads once again to Mars, looking forward to the event of China s Tianwen-1 probe s upcoming landing somewhere in the southern part of a vast plain known as Utopia Planitia on the Red Planet.
Aiming to achieve “orbiting, landing and roving” all in one mission, China s Tianwen-1 probe, which managed to smoothly reach Martian parking orbit in February, has entered crucial touchdown stage.
China sent the core module of its space station into a planned orbit on April 29. The space station has a designed lifespan of ten years, but designers believe it could last more than 15 years with appropriate maintenance and repairs.
The space station will face various threats and challenges in the cosmos, such as atomic oxygen, ultraviolet radiation, vacuums, temperature changes, space debris, and microgravity.
These may cause the material performance to decline or induce failures, thus shortening the service life of products and equipment such as extravehicular cables, surface coatings, and optical lenses.
According to Zhou Jianping, chief designer of China s manned space program, maintainability is one of the space station s advantages compared with its predecessors. Maintenance and repairs can ensure the technological upgrade and long-term and reliable operation of the space station.
Views: Visits 5 …Adds it’ll cover our security structure, help identify crooks, determine success of war against insecurity …No adequate satellite to monitor bandits, says National Space Agency D-G …Satellite engineers disagree By Johnbosco Agbakwuru President Muhammadu Buhari yesterday urged Nigerians to participate in the ongoing synchronization of National Identification Number, NIN, with SIM cards across the country, saying it would help cover the nation’s security structure and identify criminals terrorising Nigeria. The President spoke at a time the National Space Research and Development Agency, NASRDA, lamented that inadequate satellite and other facilities are affecting monitoring of bandits and other criminal elements operating in the country.