China today has shared the first video of Mars recorded by Tianwen-1 after the probe entered orbit, the latest step in Beijing’s ambitious space programme.
Incredible footage captures the Martian landscape and atmosphere out of a pitch black sky as the Chinese spacecraft flew past the Red Planet.
Launched last July around the same time as a rival US mission, the probe will remain paired in orbit for three months and is expected to touch down on Mars in May.
China National Space Administration shared the first video of Mars recorded by Tianwen-1 after the probe entered orbit, the latest step in Beijing’s ambitious space programme
Image from China National Space Administration shows the Tianwen-1 probe en route to Mars. If all goes well, it will be the second country to land successfully on the Red Planet
Following a 500-million-km journey from Earth, Tianwen-1 entered orbit around Mars on Wednesday after being launched on July 23 aboard a Long March 5 Y-4 carrier rocket from Wenchang Space Launch Centre in Hainan, China.
The five-ton spacecraft – which consists of an orbiter, lander and rover – is a step closer to Beijing’s ambitious space mission, which aims to establish a crewed space station by 2022 and eventually put a man on the moon.
For the three-month study of the planet’s soil and atmosphere, the mission will take photos, chart maps and look for signs of past life.
The probe has already sent back its first image of Mars – a black-and-white photo that showed geological features including the Schiaparelli crater and the Valles Marineris, a vast stretch of canyons on the Martian surface.
In a two-minute clip released by China National Space Administration on Thursday, the surface of the planet is seen coming into view out of a pitch black sky against the outside of the Tianwen-1.
White craters are visible on the Red Planet’s surface, which fades from white to black through the video as the Chinese probe, Tianwen-1, flies over the course of one Martian day
Incredible footage released by Chinese authorities captures the Martian landscape and atmosphere out of a pitch black sky as the Chinese spacecraft flew past the Red Planet
The footage, captured by two surveillance cameras, also shows a slight vibration of the probe after the engine was ignited.
White craters are visible on the planet’s surface, which fades from white to black through the video as the probe flies over the course of one Martian day.
It was shared by the Chinese authorities to celebrate the Lunar New Year.
If Tianwen-1 is deployed successfully in May, it will make China the first country to orbit, land and deploy a rover on its first mission to Mars.
After landing, it will survey the composition, types of substance, geological structure and meteorological environment of the Martian surface, and look for signs of alien life.
China’s space probe has sent back its first image of Mars and is scheduled to touch down on the Red Planet later this year
The Chinese spacecraft entered Mars orbit less than 24 hours after the United Arab Emirates’, Hope probe, which entered Mars orbit at around 16:15 GMT on Tuesday.
Meanwhile, a rover sent by NASA, Perseverance, will arrive next week later, on February 18, in its mission to collect rocks for return to Earth.
After watching the US and the Soviet Union lead the way during the Cold War, China has poured billions of dollars into its military-led space programme.
It has made huge strides in the past decade, sending a human into space in 2003.
The Asian powerhouse has laid the groundwork to assemble a space station by 2022 and gain a permanent foothold in Earth orbit.
‘As a first try for China, I don’t expect it to do anything significant beyond what the US has already done,’ previously said Jonathan McDowell, an astronomer at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, about the Chinese craft.
Tianwen-1 is ‘broadly comparable to Viking in its scope and ambition’, said McDowell, referring to NASA’s Mars landing missions in 1975 to 1976.
This is not China’s first attempt at Mars – in 2011, a Chinese orbiter accompanying a Russian mission was lost when the spacecraft failed to get out of Earth’s orbit after launching from Kazakhstan, eventually burning up in the atmosphere.