Success Of Tianwen-1’s Landing On Mars
历史一刻！天问一号成功着陆火星
Tianwen-1, China’s first interplanetary expedition, has spectacularly conquered a new major milestone, with its lander-rover combination successfully soft-landing at the planned site in the southern part of a vast plain known as Utopia Planitia on Mars on early Saturday morning.
According to the China National Space Administration (CNSA), Tianwen-1 probe lowered its altitude from the Martian parking orbit around 1 am Saturday, before its lander-rover combination separated with the orbiter around 4 am. The lander-rover combination then took another flight of three hours before its entry into Mars atmosphere.
The Chinese spacecraft, after entering the Mars atmosphere, spent around nine minutes decelerating, hovering for obstacle avoidance and cushioning, before its soft landing on the designated landing site at the Utopia Planitia, CNSA said.
The orbiter rose and returned to the parking orbit 30 minutes after the separation, to provide relay communication for the landing craft combo, the Chinese space agency said.
The successful touchdown of Tianwen-1 took place on the 295th day of its journey after it was launched and sent into planned orbit via a Long March-5 carrier rocket from Wenchang Spaceport in South China’s Hainan Province on July 23, 2020.
Named after an ancient fire god of Chinese mythology, the 1.85-meter-tall and some 240-kilogram Zhurong Mars rover will then be deployed. It is designed to rove the planet for at least 3 Martian months, approximately 92 days on Earth.
