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China ’s recent lunar mission is carrying a secret rover to the synodic month ’s far side , new photos discover . Eagle - eyed commentator spotted the mysterious ballistic capsule strapped to the side of a lander that is scheduled to touch down onthe moonnext calendar month — but the roaming golem ’s intention remain unknown .
On Friday ( May 3 ) , the China Academy of Space Technology ( CAST)successfully launched an autonomous Long March 5 rocket into space . This was the first stride in the country ’s Chang’e 6 missionary post , which aims to be the first - ever charge to garner samples from the moon ’s enshroud far side and carry them to Earth .
A secret moon rover (circled) has been spotted attached to China’s Chang’e 6 lunar lander in new photos.
The chief payload of the moon - bound rocket salad is a lunar lander that is expect to touch down onEarth ’s largest satelliteat some period in early June . There , the spacecraft will take in samples from the surface and then launch them back to Earth in a return module — similar to the Chang’e 5 mission , whichlanded a space vehicle on the moon in 2020andsuccessfully returned lunar samples to Earthseveral months afterward .
minuscule else was jazz about the Chang’e 6 mission before launch , other than that it would also transmit unrevealed payloads from France , Sweden , Italy and Pakistan to the lunation , SpaceNews report .
However , following the successful launch , CAST releasednew picture of the lander , and people apace noticed a little gray object with wheels strapped to the lander ’s side .
The Chang’e 6 lander and its newly revealed rover were aboard a Long March 5 rocket that launched May 3.
" Yeah , okay . That appear like a previously undisclosed miniskirt roamer on the side of the Chang’e-6 lander , " journalist Andrew Jones , who nearly survey China ’s space program , wrote in a poston the societal platform X.
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The suspected rover ’s primary task on the Sun Myung Moon remains unclear . However , a subsequenttranslated statementfrom the Shanghai Institute of Ceramics , which offer several component for the Chang’e 6 mission , revealed that it has an infrared imaging mass spectrometer although its purpose is unclear . Due to the size of the robot and the condition it will present on the moon , its mission will in all likelihood be short , SpaceNews reported .
CAST already has the Yutu-2 rover on the far side of the moon , which landed in 2019 as part of the Chang’e 4 mission — the first charge to successfully land a ballistic capsule on the far side of the moon . Yutu-2 has already made some big finds , include thediscovery of belittled trash spheres on the lunar surface .
This is not the first fourth dimension that China has surprise the populace with unrevealed payloads . During the state ’s Tianwen-1 delegacy toMarsin 2021 , several space vehicle , including a Mars orbiter and the ZhurongMars rover , unblock secret mini - camera to take selfies on or around the Red Planet , SpaceNews report .
— China reveals most elaborate geological map of the Sun Myung Moon ever make
— Haunting pic of Earth and lunation snapped by China ’s data-based lunar satellite
— Watch a Chinese rocket booster amplifier dusk from space and explode
In the past , CAST has also been closemouthed about other cognitive operation include thedemise of the Zhurong Mars roverand an incident in 2022 when a Chinese rocket carry an undisclosed objectcrashed into the moonshine ’s surface .
CAST ’s ultimate finish is to put humans on the moon by 2030 , and the government agency willstart to test - plunge a new character of big recyclable rocket next year . However , like with the young bird of passage , the detail of this mission are being observe closely under wraps .
