China's loose Chang'e: Probe lands on far side of the Moon in science first, says state media China's Chang'e 4 spacecraft has touched down on the Moon, state media reports, making it the first-ever probe to set down on the far side of Earth's natural satellite. The spacecraft, which blasted off into the heavens on December 7, was in an elliptical orbit around the Moon, swinging within 15 kilometres (nine miles) of the …
Might it not be a good idea to find out what's actually there before planning to colonize that rock? My guess is that what's there is nothing worth spending impressive amounts of money on in order to put humans up there. Robots can do the exploration better and cheaper.
Probably in future centuries some combination of need and reduced costs will justify humans in space. AFAICS, men on the moon or, worse, Mars, aren't likely going to happen in this century. At least not for more than an incredibly expensive photo-op. For that matter, why are substantial resources being wasted on the more or less pointless ISS? My opinion. Go back to the Skylab concept of a manned lab that is occasionally used when enough meaningful experiments that require direct human overersight are ready to be run. Spend the money instead on unmanned probes like this one, and on exploring the largely unexplored 70% or so of our planet that is permanently under water.
Congratulations to the Chinese for doing something in space that is actually cost effective.
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Landing a probe there is not such a great achievement. It was difficult in the 60s when you had little or no automation (Lunakhods were remotely operated). We put a probe on Titan....
All Mars probes have to land and operate automatically at its very high speed as it is too far for any kind of remote control. New Horizons has to perform all encounter operations automatically.
It's a great propaganda tool, though, as China can't go beyond Moon, it's still fifty years behind.
BTW, what's the Star Trek like logo on the left? Another breach of copyrights and IPs by Chinese?
Ignoring your dribble about how anyone could do this thing that nobody has done before, here is a good response to your accusation of unoriginality in the CNSA logo. TLDR: the US, Russia, China and Star Trek all have strikingly similar logos.
> ...as China can't go beyond Moon, it's still fifty years behind.
lol.
Really? India has sent probes to Mars. And Japan has gone to asteroids. I am sure China could easily land on Mars, but they seem fascinated by Selene.
While Elon Musk et al mutter about Mars, the Chinese are pragmatic. They know what is quickly attainable.
Too bad the USA petulantly kept them off the ISS. So? They understandably said "Fuck YOU, USA! We will build our own space station!"
Expect the next Moonwalker to be Chinese. And the next, i.e. the FIRST permanently-manned moonbase to be (mostly) Chinese.
As I posted above, it's interesting how similar the logos of some of the worlds main space agencies are. Don't get too excited.
@Robert Helpmann: " I tried going re-watching it recently..."
Yeah, same here, it dawned on me I'd never seen the final episode,.... as in 'seen'. I'd heard it, but the tube on our Telly stopped working, so I listened to the final episode back in the day.
So before Xmas I sought it out on YouTube.
Wow,.... the 'special' effects, the 'acting', sad it doesn't suffer the test of time as well as a Gerry Anderson puppet show.
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I'm well aware that it's a CGI extravaganza (at least that bit of the video), but you would expect them to get the physics right for a worldwide audience. The Chinese take the concept of 'face' very seriously and this just makes them look cheap. I guess they don't pay the CGI guy as much as the rocket scientists...
"Congratulations to China's Chang'e 4 team for what appears to be a successful landing on the far side of the moon. This is a first for humanity and an impressive accomplishment!" NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine said.
Had this been a USA landing the 'what appears to be' would be omitted.
Was the bias unconscious or official?
Why thanks, Ian, for reminding us that it was those notorious Chinese state media who first reported this achievement, and thus it is to be taken cum grano salis until El Reg - or the New York Times - reach the far side of the Moon and can ascertain the facts of the matter ! Otherwise, we might have deluded ourselves into taking those Chinese reports at face value....
Henri
it is to be taken cum grano salis until El Reg - or the New York Times - reach the far side of the Moon and can ascertain the facts of the matter
Given the tragic failure to get LOHAN off the ground, I fear it may be quite some time before an El Reg moonshot is a reality :-(
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