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Chinese Spacecraft Enters Orbit Around the Moon
mpicpp sends this report from Scientific American:
A Chinese spacecraft service module has entered orbit around the moon, months after being used in the country's landmark test flight that sent a prototype sample-return capsule on a flight around the moon and returned it to Earth. The service module from China's circumlunar test flight arrived in orbit around the moon this week, according to Chinese state media reports. The spacecraft is currently flying in an eight-hour orbit that carries it within 125 miles (200 kilometers) of the lunar surface at its closest point, and out to a range of 3,293 miles (5,300 km) at its highest point. Earlier reports noted that a camera system is onboard the service module, designed to assist in identifying future landing spots for the Chang'e 5 mission that will return lunar samples back to Earth in the 2017 time frame.
Reader schwit1 adds a detailed report on Russia's next-gen space station module, writing, "The Russians have always understood that a space station is nothing more than a prototype of an interplanetary spaceship. They are therefore simply carrying through with the same engineering research they did on their earlier Salyut and Mir stations, developing a vessel that can keep humans alive on long trips to other planets."
Glad to see someone is returning to the Moon, no matter which nation. We need more space exploration in general.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
To add to this: Mocking the only nation currently capable of bringing humans to the iss for their incompetence seems odd..
I hope it's not more SyFy, it would be great to see humans progress beyond LEO.
My ism, it's full of beliefs.
No, the Russian's were hoping to do a manned flyby as part of the Zond program, but the Proton rocket had a number of teething problems and it took awhile to become reliable enough to even consider putting people on (ultimately it never flew manned). There were also a number of problems with the Soyuz 7K-L1 spacecraft. US intelligence thought the Soviet's were closer to flying a crewed lunar flyby mission as Zond 5 was largely a successful test. However Zond 6 depressurized and crashed on re-entry (killing the animals aboard) which ended any immediate plans of a crewed launch. Apollo 8 was originally to be a "D" mission, testing the Lunar Module in Low Earth Orbit with Apollo 9 an "E" mission testing it in Medium Earth Orbit. Due to delays with the Lunar Module, they decided to swap the missions and instead send Apollo 8 into lunar orbit (with no Lunar Module). Frank Borman, Jim Lovell, and Bill Anders became the first humans to leave low Earth orbit Dec 21st, 1968. They successfully orbited the moon 10 times on Christmas day and returned Dec 27th After that the Soviet's pretty much gave up on the flyby in favor of a manned lunar landing, but they could never get the N-1 rocket to work
It's ok, someone didn't like my comment either.
"First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
The Russians landed one of the only working probes on the surface of Venus.
No human ever reached escape velocity. No human's ever been outside Earth's sphere of influence.
If I was running the Chinese space program, I'd put together a mission to the Sea of Tranquility, and bring bak some Apollo 11 souvenirs. It would be the most intense possible statement that there are now two nations on the Earth that have had the technology and will to travel to the Moon, and the USA no longer has a monopoly on it.
There is no God, and Dirac is his prophet.
"...within 125 miles (200 kilometers) of the lunar surface at its closest point, and out to a range of 3,293 miles (5,300 km) at its highest point..."
Thanks to Kerbal Space Program, I know what those are called! The first one is the periapsis and the second one is the apoapsis. :D (Yes, I know, common knowledge, but it's cool that a game taught me a thing or two about spaceflight...)
Too bad real life has the Ferram Aerospace mod enabled; this craft very likely would be unable to reenter the atmosphere and land (or splash down) without breaking up, because it's not designed to withstand the heat and drag forces.