Chinese probe successfully landed in Mars in its maiden attempt.
Dhaliya Nazreen
Probe makes historic landing on Mars | credits: China National Space Administration
Tianwen 1 is the prestigious interplanetary mission by Chinese National Space Administration (CNSA) successfully landed it's rover and lander in the red planet on May 15, 2021. The scientific intensions of this mission is to research the geology of Mars, the current and past presence of water, the internal structure of water, identification of rocks and minerals present in the surface and also to distinguish the space environment in Mars. This probe was launched on July 23, 2020 from Wenchang Space Craft Launch site in Hainan province, Southern China. Long March 5 heavy lift launch vehicle carried this probe and reached the orbit of Mars on 10th February 2021. The next 3 months the probe studied the target landing sites and landed on Mars in 15 May 2021.
Tianwen 1 is a robotic spacecraft to Mars which consists of an orbiter, deployable camera, lander and the rover named Zhurong. The spacecraft have a total mass about 5 tons, which is one of the heaviest probe launched to Mars and carries 13 scientific instruments. The rocket was about 57 m long which had a take of weight of 870 tonnes and a thrust over 1000 tonnes and also it was pretty much larger than China's previous rockets.
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Before landing o Mars the orbiter separates from land rover combination, continued to travel on it's current orbit around Mars about on Martian Year (about 687 days on Earth). It also serve as a relay back to Earth for communication with rover. Unfortunately there was a 20 mins delay during the landing stage. The probe perform all its functions ones own along with relaying on a command centre on Earth. The most challenging portion of this mission is to reduce the speed from 4.8km/s to 0 km/s with in 7-8 minutes. After its landing in Mars Zhurong rover conducted its scientific exploration for 90 Martian days (about 3 months).
Navigations and terrain cameras of the rover is comparable with human eyes' because these 2 cameras are arranged symmetrically, capturing panoramic and 3 dimensional view of the Mars. This helps the rover area. If magnetometer probe works together with another magnetometer abroad the orbiter to measure magnetic field. Unlike the Earth magnetic field surrounding the whole planet, in Mars there are only some patches pf magnetic field that allows solar wind to strip the atmosphere and dry out the planet. The climate station can measure the temperature, pressure, wind speed and direction to monitor Martian surface meteorology.
The 3 payloads that will work to discover the composition of red planet are:
- The multispectral camera: Surveys element mineral and rock types
- The Mars surface composition detector: Looks for hydrated minerals by vaporizing rock and analysing its composition.
- The ground penetration radar digs deeper into surface 10 to 100 metres down into ground to survey the soil structure and search for water.
This space exploration so really a milestone for China. China become the first nation to land successfully in Mars on its maiden attempt. China even made broader plans for future that includes the Mars sample return mission and visit to Jupiter in 2030.