China Successfully Launches Second Moon Probe 86
China launched its second unmanned Moon mission on Friday, sending the Chang'e II probe on a five-day journey to reach lunar orbit. "The probe plans to test technology in preparation for an unmanned moon landing in 2012, with a possible manned lunar mission to follow in 2017. China's other space plans include the launch of the first module of a future space station next year followed by the dispatch of manned spacecraft to dock with it. ... After its six-month mission, Chang'e II will either land on the moon as an experiment for future probes, fly further into outer space, or change its course and begin orbiting the Earth, Xinhua cited chief designer Huang Jiangchuan as saying." The Planetary Society blog has pictures and video of the launch.
Manned lunar mission? (Score:5, Insightful)
manned lunar mission doesn't have to mean a landing. It could just be their normal orbital vehicle on a figure eight trajectory around the moon.
Re:Manned lunar mission? (Score:5, Interesting)
Yes, what annoys me is that the US news media keeps talking about China's plans to put humans on the Moon but they never provide any references. It's never "the Minister Of Space said," or some other quote from a respectable source, it's just stated as fact.
Whenever official Chinese sources are quoted as talking about a human spaceflight program they say their plans are to build their own LEO space station, not lunar missions. As far as I'm aware there has never been any official statement of a human lunar program - and currently they simply don't have the boosters to do it and so far they haven't announced any plans to build launch vehicles capable of taking humans to the Moon.
There's simply no Asian space race to the Moon, despite how much the US media wants one.
Congratulation (Score:5, Interesting)
Before this thread is filled with vile racist posts, let me first congratulate China on the launch of its 2nd moon surveyor, Chang Er 2.
I know that this message will be modded down because a lot of people hate China for some reasons.
Re:Congraturation (Score:1, Insightful)
I can't really recall Slashdot being a forum for overt racism in the past.
I know that this post will be modded down because I am invoking the Principal of Reverse Psychology.
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You're going to be modded down because it's 'principle', not 'principal', you oaf.
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I'm sober and married. You lucky bastard!
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What happened during the last year? I seem to be under the impression that it intensified to silly levels only during the last year...
Anyway, here's hoping that when anybody puts a lander on the moon, there will be a webcam with live view provided (hey, it won't change much, image once every few minutes will be more than enough). And when some rover - the video stream used for teleoperation will be likewise available on the web.
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Note that China is a nation, not a race -- is it possible that some China-haters might actually hate China not because OMFG THEY R TEH YELLLOOWWWW!!!, but because of things China has done/continues to do that they find morally repugnant?
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Nope. Xenophobia and righteous indignation are both factors, but not they main ones. If so, there would be just as much angst over less powerful nations where people look and think differently. And also, we wouldn't be discussing China's moon program; we'd be discussing how to use our diplomatic and economic inf
It's Communism WE can BELIEVE in! (Score:4, Insightful)
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[citation needed]
anonymous coward needs a citation? (Score:2)
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Agreed.
There are certain pieces of information that are common knowledge in certain groups.
For example, everyone in the slashdot audience knows that the RIAA is a lawsuit factory, that Iran is renowned for human rights abuses, and that TCP/IP is the language of the internet.
The rudeness of demanding citations rises in direct proportion to the product of the commonality of said knowledge and its obviousness, and in inverse proportion to the square of its incredulity.
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Never mind half their population live on $1 a day!
Yes, and there are beggars in every country on this planet, let all countries stop their space program right this moment.
Nevermind that the entire Chang'e space program cost less than a single Space Shuttle launch.
But go ahead with the China bashing, you will get modded up no matter what.
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Yes, because having a space program has no positive impact on the research and manufacturing in China. High tech industries won't help improve conditions for at least some Chinese workers. Those people would be better off if they had not bothered getting an education and gone to work in some textile factory or assembling iPods instead.
Exchange rate? (Score:3, Insightful)
True or not, it doesn't matter.
The real question is what does that buy? I know many Americans who make $100 a day and still can't make ends meet.
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"Chinese" is a nationality, not a race. (Score:1, Informative)
"Chinese" is a nationality. It is not a race. There are people of many races who are Chinese.
Racism can't arise when we aren't dealing with a race!
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Quite true, but many racists in America use "Chinese" to mean "any o' them thar yellar people."
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"Jew" is not a race either. Historically, the term "racist" had a broader and somewhat incorrect meaning, but this is English we're talking about, not Lojban.
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Before this thread is filled with vile racist posts, let me first congratulate China on the launch of its 2nd moon surveyor, Chang Er 2.
I know that this message will be modded down because a lot of people hate China for some reasons.
Strawman much? Most criticism of China these days is culturally and politically motivated, and whether you agree with any of it or not, has nothing whatsoever to do with race.
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The atrocities of racism in the past would have been explained by the dominant society as "culturally and politically motivated".
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massacred/killed/genocided - Citation Needed?
If you're counting civil war casualties, economic failures, etc., then yeah, probably not *just* 50 Million.
The Amercian cold-war propaganda would like you to believe that they are all caused by an "evil mind" behind the communist regime. Drink your koolaid as you please.
And what would you want the direct descendants to do for their past "crimes", suppose the allegations are valid? Commit seppuku?
Who hates China? (Score:2)
a lot of people hate China for some reasons
Who hates the PRC? If America were to offer me the world on a silver platter, I'd take it, too; the PRC is just doing what nations do. Now those Americans who are lining up to give everything America has away? Those Americans who are sacrificing the future of the American people and our country to make a fast buck today?
Them I don't like.
The truly infuriating thing is that those particular Americans - Corporate America's owners and operators - are "the right", and our right claims "patriotism" as one
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With perfecting automatic rendezvouz, one doesn't really need large/rarely used/exceedingly expensive (vs. almost assembly-line manufactured, efficient in "kg to LEO per cost", not launch) booster. Also, chief scientist of their lunar exploration program is an outspoken supporter of manned exploration.
Re:Manned lunar mission? (Score:5, Interesting)
While there may be no official word. The fact that they created a copy of the Vehicle Assembly Building indicates that they are prepared to work on lunar capable, Saturn V sized boosters when the need arises.
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The article below, while saying China is pulling away from India, still lists china as only getting a moon rock sample in 2017. That is an unmanned mission. China has pledged to put a man on the moon by 2025.
But I suspect China and India are racing for 2020.
http://www.peopleforum.cn/viewthread.php?tid=40438 [peopleforum.cn]
I think China is on schedule:
http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1653384&cid=32219866 [slashdot.org]
Chang'e 2 - 2010, second lunar orbiter
Chang'e 3 - 2013, lunar lander
Chang'e 4 - 2017, return lunar sample to earth
C
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Yes, it seems the manned mission is 2020. Articles refer to China state media.
http://www.bangkokpost.com/breakingnews/195665/china-to-launch-next-lunar-space-mission [bangkokpost.com]
http://www.cosmosmagazine.com/news/3747/moist-moon-hinders-chinas-lunar-telescope [cosmosmagazine.com]
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20100910/sc_afp/chinaspacemoon [yahoo.com]
It's questionable whether that is a landing mission or whether the landing missing is 2025.
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leaping ahead (Score:5, Insightful)
Thanks to self-interested politicians like Utah's Orrin Hatch [nasawatch.com] and others who'd rather fatten up on pork [nytimes.com], China has a viable space program, while the US just has a money sink that keeps corporations flush in fat lobbying budgets.
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"Auf deutsch und auf englisch
kenn' ich den Countdown.
Jetzt lern' ich chinesisch!"
sagt Wernher von Braun.
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"US just has a money sink..."
Obama recently cancelled a big chunk of Nasa's human space exploration program. Does that make you happier?
The space program, like most big budget government programs, is by definition a lobby-driven money sink and always has been. However, it has accomplished some great things nonetheless.
What's more, how is it somehow OK to budget a trillion or two we don't have for corporate bailouts and healthcare entitlement pork, yet we can't afford $5B/year to keep Constellation going?
Good for them! (Score:5, Insightful)
I love it when any nation does ambitious explorations like this, to progress and promote their general state of science and technology.
I just hope they release any findings freely - I do dislike the idea of scientific projects where most of the results end up state/company secrets.
Ryan Fenton
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"July 1969 A.D. We Came in Peace For All Mankind."
If Mankind can return during my lifetime, I'll be delighted. I don't particularly care which section of Mankind leads the way - I'll rejoice with them when we venture out again.
Think what we could accomplish if we all worked together? Maybe someday we could get out of our own back yard.
Pre-emptive posting (Score:2, Insightful)
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Yes, you missed the iconoclastic, exhaustive list of possible objection vectors.
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NASA, oh NASA why can't you be more like China. Oh wait you have a stupid president that likes to waste 10 times more money than needed on trivial solutions available almost everywhere(Universal Health Case) but in the US.
You've got to think like the aspiring future head of a global tyranny. If you go and advance space exploration by the US, that will only serve to engender hope among America's people that escape and/or better days may one day be possible. Hopes and dreams are powerful motivators and must be crushed at every opportunity. Complete demoralization, hopelessness, and resignation to their fate is the preferred state of mind for slaves, after all.
Strat
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Great job China, you're just 50 years late (smug).
I'd laugh my ass off if China went to the moon, kicked down the American flag and put up their own.
They can do that?
manned lunar mission doesn't have to mean a landing. It could just be their normal orbital vehicle on a figure eight trajectory around the moon.
Which puts it in retrograde orbit suitable to launch plastic or sand at existing satellites.
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Anything I missed?
We have to attack them now as they are weaponising the moon.
Where's the competition? (Score:2, Interesting)
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Considering that its taken NASA 30 years to get over the first one, and we're still recovering, the last thing we need is another one.
Space races lead to expensive one-off architectures that achieve their goal but are too expensive to be used for much else. NASA needs to learn how to develop flexible systems that can be revised and re-purposed with minimal modifications, short time-frames, and within the historical post-Apollo budget.
I fear if we got in another space race with China, we'd achieve more flag
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that's great (Score:2, Interesting)
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Re:that's great (Score:4, Insightful)
It has already happened. The USA sent a number of men to the moon.
And a great many of us were not alive when this happened. Along with GPP, I'd like to see another man on the Moon. Yes, the United States did it. Yes, we Americans briefly touched greatness. Yes, we took our first baby steps out into the next great frontier and the only real long term future for humanity. And then, like frightened or chastised children, we fled back to the safety of our mother's skirt and have remained there ever since.
I am not discounting at all the greatness achieved by unmanned exploratory missions. I think they are some of the finest achievements of humankind (We've sent probes out of the solar system!). But, I can't help but feel a thrill that some humans somewhere on the planet are actively working towards once again stepping away from our mother. And I wouldn't be able to help feeling some measure of pride to see that happen again. And I would be even more proud to see humans take further steps out into the solar system.
And, I couldn't care less if they are speaking Chinese when they do it.
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It has already happened.
1) I wasn't even born then. It's completely different experience being able to follow the whole endeavour - live - from the beginning, I imagine.
2) Now we have way better AV equipment.
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I'd like to see it, too, but for different reasons.
The U.S. ventured out to the Moon in the late 1960s. Afterwards, they got hung up in Earth orbit with Skylab and the Space Shuttle, doing scientific experiments and hoping to find something interesting to get private industry involved ("make pure crystals in zero G!"). Generally speaking, private industry didn't care except for some of the medical research. But since the Apollo missions, NASA hasn't done much with the Moon.
Hopefully, someone else will.
Second moon probe? (Score:4, Funny)
They finished probing the first moon already?
Second moon ? (Score:4, Funny)
Is that the one with the likeness of a jumping mouse on? (The Freman call it Muad'dib)
A Kick in the Pants? (Score:2)
I hope this is the kick in the pants the US needs to restart out space program. I was saddened when NASA got 'demoted.' It felt like we lost something. I dont know.
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I disagree, they're more private companies doing space in the US today you can't just look at NASA and come to the conclusion that space travel in the US is dead.
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Not to discount the efforts of such companies, but I will be ready to get really excited about them and see the hope they offer when they actually put a person into orbit.
I'm sure it's coming, and I'm waiting, but I have a hard time getting excited about it until it happens. There won't be much, if any, profit from space for quite some time, and it's kind of hard to imagine modern corporations, with their short-sightedness and desire for immediate return, to actually commit and go through with such a huge i
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Big Boost in their Program (Score:2)
With all the engineers NASA has laid-off expect a big boost to their space and defense program.
Firefly... (Score:1)
...here we come! [wikipedia.org]
Seriously though, doesn't it worry anyone that most of the other big countries are more interested in space-related projects than the United States or Europe is? With all of China's plans, and the United States cutting it's space programs, you have to wonder where this will take us in the long term. Space is humanity's final frontier, yet Americans seem to be wholly uninterested in space travel, as do Europeans. Talking to most people on either side of the pond usually results in a "Space t
Big Red Button (Score:1)
How quaint...
It hasn't been this exciting since Apollo (Score:2, Interesting)
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Oh yeah? So what? (Score:2)
My hope (Score:2)
Honestly, my hope is that the strides being made by China and India into space will spark the US into action to become competitive again. However, I am fully aware that given the current state of US politics and politicians that is so incredibly unlikely. Things like this spurring the US into action reminds me of Merry and Pip trying to spur the Ents into action in LOTR... except that with the USA there won't be a sudden realization that the battle needs to be fought until Mordor is already long since lost.
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And that's what I get for posting without sufficient coffee in my system... I meant of course Middle Earth ;)
of course OR on course (Score:1)
What other options are there? Disapear into anoher dimension? They could just let it ride and manage one of the three no matter where the thing goes. If their calculations or timing are wrong or if they experience mechanical failure, they will at least hit their target.