Tianwen-1, China’s mission to Mars, has entered orbit

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Tianwen-1, whose name means “search for heavenly truth,” consists of an orbiter, a lander and a six-wheeled rover carrying scientific instruments, according to the National Space Administration of China (CNSA).

The CNSA said it would gather important information about the geological structure, atmosphere, environment and soil of Mars and look for any signs of water. The spacecraft is expected to land on the planet’s surface in May or June.

Tianwen-1 makes China the sixth country in history to reach Mars.

Tianwen-1 was launched in July last year, along with two other international missions to Mars: NASA’s Perseverance rover and the United Arab Emirates Hope spacecraft.

All three missions launched at the same time due to the alignment between Mars and Earth on the same side of the sun, making a more efficient journey to the red planet.

NASA’s Perseverance Rover will land on Mars on February 18th.

China's Tianwen-1 sends back its first image of Mars
So far, the United States and the former Soviet Union are the only two countries to land a spacecraft. on the surface of Mars. But the European Space Agency and India have previously sent spacecraft into orbit – and on Tuesday, the United Arab Emirates joined their ranks, with its Hope spacecraft successfully entering orbit.

With Tianwen-1, China is the first nation to attempt to send both an orbiter and a rover on its first local mission to Mars. According to the scientific team behind the mission, the probe will “orbit, land and release a rover all on the first attempt and coordinate the observations with an orbiter.”

In contrast, NASA sent several orbiters to Mars before ever attempting a landing, because retracting the landing is a much more difficult task.

The Chinese rover is expected to stay for three months, hoping to gather important information about the planet.

China’s space ambitions

Wednesday’s news marks the latest success for China’s ambitious space sector, which has transformed rapidly in recent decades.

Although Chinese authorities and state media hailed Tianwen-1 as the country’s first mission to Mars, this is not true.

China’s first attempt to reach Mars was actually in 2011 with the Yinghuo-1 spacecraft, which was to orbit the red planet and study its environmental structure. It was launched from Kazakhstan in tandem with the Russian Phobos-Grunt mission in November that year.
But the mission failed, with a malfunction that blocked the probe into Earth’s orbit shortly after launch. In 2012, the spacecraft re-entered Earth atmosphere and fell back to Earth, landing in the Pacific Ocean.
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It was a disappointing blow to the country’s young space program, which has historically lagged behind other countries. Beijing launched its first manned spaceflight in 2003 alone, more than 40 years after NASA.

But all that has changed in recent years.

Under President Xi Jinping, who took office in 2013, China has invested billions of dollars in its space program, launched space labs and satellites into orbit, and landed three unmanned spacecraft on the moon.

The government has chosen space as a national research priority, especially deep space explorations and orbiting spacecraft. Increasingly, Chinese private companies are also investing in space research and technology.

In addition to the Tianwen-1 Mars mission, Beijing plans to launch a permanent space station by 2022 and aims to send astronauts to the moon – possibly in the 2030s.

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