Moon: China launches satellite that will be used in mission – 03/20/2024 – Science

China launched this Wednesday (20) a satellite that will bridge communications between operations on Earth and a mission to the far side of the Moon.

The rocket with the 1.2-ton Queqiao-2 satellite and two smaller satellites, Tiandu-1 and Tiandu-2, left Hainan province, in the south of the country, according to state media.

The near side of the Moon always faces Earth. This means that data transfers on the other side, the far side, are impossible, as there is no direct line of sight.

The equipment will orbit the satellite and transmit signals for the Chang’e-6 mission, whose launch is scheduled for May this year. In this robotic mission, the objective is to recover samples from an ancient basin, acquiring material from the far side of the Moon for the first time.

The idea is also to use it as a relay platform for the Chang’e-7 and Chang’e-8 lunar missions, scheduled for 2026 and 2028 respectively.

In addition, Queqiao-2 will integrate a network of relay satellites to establish a communication bridge for manned lunar missions and exploration on other planets such as Mars and Venus.

The Tiandu-1 and Tiandu-2 satellites will be used in tests to build this network, which will also provide communications, navigation and remote sensing support for China’s research station planned for the south pole of the Moon.

Today, there are half a dozen satellites in the Moon’s orbit launched by other countries, including the United States, India and Japan.

The Queqiao-2’s projected lifespan of at least eight years is expected to allow it to support lunar missions beyond 2030, when China hopes to place its first astronauts on the Moon.

Queqiao-2’s orbit will be highly elliptical, reaching up to 8,600 km above the lunar surface and enabling a communications link between Earth and the satellite for more than eight hours, its designer, Zhang Lihua, wrote in an article published in 2021 in Space: Science & Technology magazine.

For the remainder of its orbit, Queqiao-2 will be about 300 km from the lunar soil.

Queqiao-2 will replace the aging Queqiao-1, launched in 2018. This was the first relay satellite deployed to the far side of the Moon, supporting the Chang’e-4 mission.

In 2019, Chang’e-4 was the first spacecraft to perform a soft landing on the far side of the Moon, successfully delivering the Yutu-2 robotic rover, which is still in operation.