Mars Exploration News  
MARSDAILY
Tianwen 1 enters Mars' polar orbit
by Staff Writers
Beijing (XNA) Feb 16, 2021

Part of the team at CNSA overseeing the Tianwen-1 mission to Mars.

China's Tianwen 1 robotic probe entered orbit above Mars' polar regions on Monday, moving closer to the red planet, the China National Space Administration said.

The spacecraft activated its 3,000-Newton-thrust orbital-control engine at 5 pm to conduct an orbital plane change maneuver to enter polar orbit with a perigee of about 265 kilometers above the red planet, the administration said in a brief statement.

Next, the probe will carry out several orbital adjustment operations to move itself into a parking orbit.

In parking orbit, it will make observations and investigations of the preset landing site.

Before the latest maneuver, Tianwen 1 was travelling around an elliptical Martian orbit with a perigee of about 400 kilometers after its arrival in Mars' gravitational field on Wednesday night, becoming the first Chinese spacecraft to reach the planet.

Tianwen 1, the country's first independent Mars mission, was launched by a Long March 5 heavy-lift carrier rocket on July 23 from the Wenchang Space Launch Center in Hainan province, kicking off the nation's planetary exploration program.

The 5-metric ton probe, which consists of two major parts - the orbiter and the landing capsule - flew for 202 days and about 475 million km on its journey to Mars. Its average flight speed was about 100,000 kilometers per hour.

During its journey, the spacecraft conducted four midcourse corrections and a deep-space orbital maneuver to make sure it was always precisely aimed at Mars.

The Tianwen 1 mission's ultimate goal is to land a rover in May or June on the southern part of Mars' Utopia Planitia - a large plain within Utopia, the largest recognized impact basin in the solar system -to conduct scientific surveys.

Tianwen 1 is the world's 46th Mars exploration mission since October 1960, when the former Soviet Union launched the first Mars-bound spacecraft. Only 18 of those missions were successful.

Source: Xinhua News Agency


Related Links
China National Space Administration
Mars News and Information at MarsDaily.com
Lunar Dreams and more


Thanks for being here;
We need your help. The SpaceDaily news network continues to grow but revenues have never been harder to maintain.

With the rise of Ad Blockers, and Facebook - our traditional revenue sources via quality network advertising continues to decline. And unlike so many other news sites, we don't have a paywall - with those annoying usernames and passwords.

Our news coverage takes time and effort to publish 365 days a year.

If you find our news sites informative and useful then please consider becoming a regular supporter or for now make a one off contribution.
SpaceDaily Contributor
$5 Billed Once


credit card or paypal
SpaceDaily Monthly Supporter
$5 Billed Monthly


paypal only


MARSDAILY
China's Tianwen-1 probe enters Mars orbit: state media
Beijing (AFP) Feb 10, 2021
China's Tianwen-1 probe entered the orbit of the planet Mars on Wednesday, state media said, after it launched from southern China last July. It is the latest step in Beijing's ambitious space programme, which aims to establish a crewed space station by 2022 and eventually put a man on the moon, and has opened up a new, extraterrestrial arena for US-China competition. Tianwen-1 launched around the same time as a rival US mission, and is expected to touch down on the Red Planet in May. Its s ... read more

Comment using your Disqus, Facebook, Google or Twitter login.



Share this article via these popular social media networks
del.icio.usdel.icio.us DiggDigg RedditReddit GoogleGoogle

MARSDAILY
Ozmens' SNC delivers prototype lunar crew module to DYNETICS

How to Get Water on the Moon

Teaching an Old Spacecraft New Tricks to Continue Exploring the Moon

Goddard's Core Flight Software Chosen for NASA's Lunar Gateway

MARSDAILY
Chinese tracking vessel sets sail for monitoring missions in Indian Ocean

China's 'space dream': A Long March to the Moon and beyond

Three generations dedicated to space program

China's space station core module, cargo craft pass factory review

MARSDAILY
What Hollywood gets wrong, and right, about asteroids

Ceramic chips inside meteorites hint at wild days of the early solar system

NASA's first mission to the Trojan Asteroids installs its final scientific instrument

NASA's OSIRIS-REx to Fly a Farewell Tour of Bennu

MARSDAILY
Solar system's most distant planetoid confirmed

Peering at the Surface of a Nearby Moon

A Hot Spot on Jupiter

The 15th Anniversary of New Horizons Leaving Earth

MARSDAILY
Saturn's Tilt Caused By Its Moons

Astronomers estimate Titan's largest sea is 1,000 feet deep

SwRI models point to a potentially diverse metabolic menu at Enceladus

MARSDAILY
Slovenia releases color image from NEMO-HD microsat

NOAA selects Woolpert to collect Topo-Bathy Lidar, imagery over Hawaiian islands

Emissions of ozone-eating chemical CFC-11 are on the decline again

ACTIVATE begins second year of Marine Cloud Study

MARSDAILY
Ball Aerospace to integrate and test "sailcraft" for NASA solar propulsion demonstration

The Planetary Society Presents NASA Recommendations to the Biden-Harris Administration

Early crewed travel to Mars

Best way to get around the Solar System

MARSDAILY
NASA's TESS discovers new worlds in a river of young stars

Lasers reveal the secret interior of rocky exoplanets

A new way of forming planets

Super-Earth atmospheres probed at Sandia's Z machine









The content herein, unless otherwise known to be public domain, are Copyright 1995-2024 - Space Media Network. All websites are published in Australia and are solely subject to Australian law and governed by Fair Use principals for news reporting and research purposes. AFP, UPI and IANS news wire stories are copyright Agence France-Presse, United Press International and Indo-Asia News Service. ESA news reports are copyright European Space Agency. All NASA sourced material is public domain. Additional copyrights may apply in whole or part to other bona fide parties. All articles labeled "by Staff Writers" include reports supplied to Space Media Network by industry news wires, PR agencies, corporate press officers and the like. Such articles are individually curated and edited by Space Media Network staff on the basis of the report's information value to our industry and professional readership. Advertising does not imply endorsement, agreement or approval of any opinions, statements or information provided by Space Media Network on any Web page published or hosted by Space Media Network. General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) Statement Our advertisers use various cookies and the like to deliver the best ad banner available at one time. All network advertising suppliers have GDPR policies (Legitimate Interest) that conform with EU regulations for data collection. By using our websites you consent to cookie based advertising. If you do not agree with this then you must stop using the websites from May 25, 2018. Privacy Statement. Additional information can be found here at About Us.