China Prepares Mission to Land Spacecraft on Moon's Far Side

Chang'e 5 is scheduled to launch in December. Chang'e 5 will be the first robotic lunar sample return mission since Luna 24 in 1976. Americans never had a robotic lunar sample return mission. If successful, Chang'e 5 will pave the way for China manned moon mission in the 2020s.

a reply to: OneBigMonkeyToo

So far we have seen landing and surface images that match up with the observations of other satellites. If you have evidence to the contrary, put it up or take the alternative.

Why post it up. Go and have a look there is plently plenty there.
If you are inrested I suggest starting with Kubrick the Shinning. Have a look and educatate yourself. Thats your job not mine.

You can bring a horse to water you cannot make it drink.

a reply to: purplemer

Somebody kicked Kubrick in the shin?

How about we stay on the topic of the OP and the landing itself and not derail this thread with Moon Hoax theories.

If you want to discuss that, or put forth the idea that China is hoaxing this, then by all means create your own thread on the subject, but do not derail this one.

I made a 3D model of the area in the distance that you can see in the image:

www.dropbox.com...

it's not quite the entire width as the JAXA data from which it is compiled are, frankly, a bit of a mess down there. You'll need to open the index.html file in either Microsoft Edge or Firefox, it doesn't work in Chrome.

I'm currently downloading the Chinese DEM data that will have much better coverage, but as every byte must be scrutinised by a committee before it goes to the decadent capitalist west it is painfully slow.

a reply to: Phage

I will put a thread up sometime about it. I find it interesting. Please feel free to come along and mock.

:-)

And here is the Chinese 3D model I promised. The DEM data is 20m resolution, and I've georectified (selenorectified?) the 7m resolution on top instead of the 20m resolution DOM image. There's a bit of distortion but not enough to affect the rendering.

www.dropbox.com...

Extract the files and open the index2.html file in either Microsoft Edge or Firefox (not Chrome).

This is an image I exported from it showing the same hills in the distance visible in the surface image:

We have our first panorama from the far side! www.xinhuanet.com...

The China National Space Administration (CNSA) Friday released the 360-degree panoramic photos taken by a camera installed on the top of the lander.

The images were sent back via the relay satellite Queqiao, which was operating around the second Lagrangian point of the earth-moon system, about 455,000 km from the earth, where it can see both the earth and the moon's far side.

Scientists have made a preliminary analysis on the terrains and landform surrounding the probe according to the panoramic pictures.

Check this out (make sure to go full-screen)
www.360cities.net...

and here's the video:

(annoying sound track alert!)

The rover deploys!

That's totes amazballs.

I wish I was born in a time when we were far more advanced at this stuff