China Looks To Be Next To Put Man On The Moon

Red Orbit ^ | 9/05/2012 | Brett Smith

[mojito]

I’ll believe it when I see it.

[History Repeats]

I vote we volunteer Obama as their man and send along Biden, but only under one condition. That they leave them there.

[gov_bean_ counter]

That's a long way to go for take-out.

[SeekAndFind]

Un-manned Moon landing in 2013

[bert]

There are virtually no democrats with the math and science ability to be considered for the task. Obama and Biden are at base lawyers and that means they are grossly ignorant of technical matters

[Telepathic Intruder]

As long as we name the newly-formed crater after them.

[SeekAndFind]

China is planning to send a robotic exploration rover to the Moon around 2013.

Next will come Chang'e-3, which is scheduled to land in Sinus Iridium sometime “around 2013.” This will be the mission with an unmanned lunar lander and a 120-kilogram autonomous lunar rover, able to choose its own routes, avoid obstacles, and perform science experiments with a suite of sensors, including cameras, x-ray and infrared spectrometers, and a ground-penetrating radar. (See image above; all images are photos of slides presented during the talk.)

[a fool in paradise]

They do realize there is no green cheese up there, right?

[SeekAndFind]

I’ll believe it when I see it.

Slowly getting there...

[Army Air Corps]

Ping.

[supremedoctrine]

Yeah, but then they’ll leave him there.
You know China.

[throwback]

Sounds like a bullet train in space. I’d be cross training out of the Chinese astronaut program.

[massgopguy]

The week that the first Taikonaut orbited the Earth. All the American Press reported on was Rush Limbaugh’s drug problem.

[isthisnickcool]

The Chinese just landed that Curiosity rover on Mars.

Oh wait. That was not them was it. LOL!

[Joe Boucher]

To do so would have to be a very open display.
If they do it, congrats.
If not it is for the world to see for a change

[ßuddaßudd]

Im thinking un-manned moon landing by 2016 first . . .

[NCC-1701]

How big would their version of our Lunar Module be? With the legs folded, our LM was a sizable spacecraft. It filled the SLA on top of the Saturn V S-IVB. Currently, China doesn’t have a launch vehicle that could lift a similar spacecraft. Even a scaled down LM would be puching the booster capability. They would then need a seperate launch for the crew. Seems that they have a long way to go before they can even think of traipsing out where we’ve already been.

[Little Ray]

To heck with that. It has already been done.
Pull on the Big-Boy Superpower britches and put in a permanent base!

[Little Ray]

Heck with that. I bet they use a multi-vehicle launch. One carries the command module, the other the lunar module. With a little planning, you can bring more mass and more fuel and land a bigger team.