China's Chang'e-4 probe soft-lands on moon's far side - Xinhua

[JSCh]

 

[JSCh]

 

[LKJ86]

 

[Nan Yang]

NASA moon orbiter spots Chang'e 4 lander in a crater

NASA's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter tracks down China's moon lander and snaps a picture.
BY AMANDA KOOSER
FEBRUARY 6, 2019 11:44 AM PST

Chang'e
4 is pointed to by small white arrows near the lower right-hand side of this LRO image.

NASA/GSFC/Arizona State University
You'll need to squint to spot it, but NASA'sLunar Reconnaissance Orbiter managed to capture a look at the Chinese National Space Agency's (CNSA) Chang'e 4 lander hanging out on the far side of the moon.

Chang'e 4 touched down on Jan. 3 in the Von Kármán crater. LRO took the image on Jan. 30.
"As LRO approached the crater from the east, it rolled 70° to the west to snap this spectacular view looking across the floor towards the west wall," writes Mark Robinson for Arizona State University's LRO Camera site.

The lander, which is about the size of a car, appears as a tiny bright spot. Chang'e 4 released its Jade Rabbit 2 lunar rover in early January, but the small machine is not visible in the LRO image.

Here's a closer look at the bright spot that is the Chang'e 4 lander.

NASA/GSFC/Arizona State University
NASA announced in mid-January it had discussed observing Chang'e 4's landing plume with CNSA in order to learn more about how dust is kicked up during a spacecraft landing
China's lander is the first spacecraft to land on the far side of the moon, sometimes called the dark side even though it gets plenty of sunlight. The lander and rover are both powered by solar panels.

Chang'e 4 is on a mission to learn more about this mysterious region of the moon. It also hosted a short-lived attempt to sprout plants within a container.
China already has its eyes set on another moon mission in 2019, but this time it plans to bring back lunar samples. If successful, those lunar bits will be the first brought back to Earth in decades.

 

[LKJ86]

The movement path of the rover Yutu-2

 

[JohnWick]

Is that toy found any alien spaceship there?

 

[Jlaw]

Yutu 2 has an Indian mentality. Its sleeping on the job more often than working.

Is that toy found any alien spaceship there?

Those aliens spacecraft are not real.

 

[oprih]

Awesome, thanks for the updates!
Meanwhile i heard from reliable source that the americans will send their own rover soon to the nearest hollywood studio.

 

[Oldman1]

Awesome, thanks for the updates!
Meanwhile i heard from reliable source that the americans will send their own rover soon to the nearest hollywood studio.

Indeed, it will land on Mars background setting at Hollywood.

 

[Jlaw]

Awesome, thanks for the updates!
Meanwhile i heard from reliable source that the americans will send their own rover soon to the nearest hollywood studio.

they killed Stanley Kubrik who filmed the fake moon landing. maybe they will use James Cameron?

 

[JSCh]

New update from LROC -> Exciting New Images | Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter Camera

Chang'e 4 Rover Comes into View

The Chang'e 4 rover is now visible to LROC! Just beyond the tip of the right arrow is the rover and the lander is to the right of the tip of the left arrow. The image appears blocky because it is enlarged 4x to make it easier to see the two vehicles. North is to the upper right, LROC NAC M1303570617LR [NASA/GSFC/Arizona State University].

On 30 January LROC acquired a spectacular limb shot centered on the Chang'e 4 landing site, looking across the floor of Von Kármán crater. At the time, LRO was more than 200 kilometers from the landing site so Chang'e 4 was only a few pixels across and the rover was not discernable. The following day LRO was closer to the site and again slewed (59° this time) to capture another view. This time the small Yutu-2 rover shows up (two pixels) just north of the lander. Also, shadows cast by the lander and rover are now visible.

Chang'e 4 lander (near tip of left arrow) and rover (near tip of right arrow) nestled among craters on the floor of Von Kármán crater. Image is 1700 meters (5580 feet) wide across the center, LROC NAC M1303570617 [NASA/GSFC/Arizona State University].

At some time after the formation of Von Kármán crater, the crater floor was covered by eruptions of basaltic lava, similar to the eruptions in Hawaii last summer. Chang'e 4 will collect compositional measurements of these farside basaltic rocks, and lunar scientists are anxiously awaiting these results. Do volcanic rocks on the farside differ from the basalts collected from the nearside? We will have to wait and see!

A striking aspect of the floor of Von Kármán crater is the number and variety of impact craters. There is a high density of craters because the surface is more than 3 billion years old! During those 3 billion years, so many small craters (<200 meters (660 feet) in diameter) formed that when a new one forms, the total number of craters does not increase. This seemingly counterintuitive situation occurs because each new crater erases, on average, one older crater of comparable size, a state known as "equilibrium" to crater counting geologists. For surfaces this old (in equilibrium), only larger craters (>1000 meters (3280 feet) diameter), which are not in equilibrium, continue to increase in density and can be used to estimate the age of the surface.

Note also all of the small craters that have formed on top of larger ones. Smaller impacts wear down and degrade larger craters over time. You can easily see a wide variety of crater degradation states, ranging from sharp and crisp (new) to highly degraded (old). As result of all of these impacts (small and large), the surface of the Moon consists of a very fine powder known as regolith, in which the Apollo astronauts made their distinct boot prints. Explore the variety of craters across the floor of Von Kármán crater in the full NAC image (below).

 

[LKJ86]

The movement path of the rover Yutu-2
View attachment 537690

 

[JSCh]

16:42, 11-Feb-2019
Chinese moon lander rests as people head to work after Spring Festival
By Gong Zhe

After a week of resting during the Spring Festival, Chinese people are returning to work on Monday.

But China's moon lander and rover are doing just the opposite. They are entering sleep mode at about 19:00 BJT on Monday as the far side of the moon enters nighttime.

Day and night both last about two weeks on the moon, which is much longer than on Earth.

China's latest moon lander, Chang'e-4, and rover, Yutu-2, are both powered by the sunlight. So they have to enter a low-power state like a laptop to prevent a forced shutdown at night.

Both devices did a good job during the past fortnight. The working conditions of each system were normal, the data transmission was normal and the scientific load – such as the infrared imaging spectrometer and neutral atomic detector – successfully carried out scientific exploration activities. The patrol moved to LEO0210 at 2:22 BJT on February 11 and accumulated about 120 meters on the moon.

The rover is expected to wake up on February 28, and the lander is expected to awaken on March 1 to continue scientific exploration activities.

Wish you goodnight, little rabbit.

(Wu Lei also made contributions to the story.)

 

[LKJ86]

 

[LKJ86]