Dear MEL Topic Readers,
Xi sends congratulatory letter on Mars probe's historic landing
Though it is a neighboring planet, the distance to Mars ranges from 55 million to 400 million kilometers depending on the two planets’ orbits. With that distance, it takes about five to 20 minutes for a radio signal to travel. Though Mars's surface gravity is only less than 40% of that of Earth’s, any object will fall on the ground. Though the air on Mars is less than 1% as dense as that of Earth, a high-speed falling object will encounter a significant force of air resistance. Now you understand why sending a probe and landing on Mars is such a challenging task for any space agency that only one Soviet and five US rovers had been successfully landed on Mars until May 15 when Chinese robotic probe Tianwen 1 touched down and deployed Zhurong rover, the name of an ancient Chinese god of fire. It was surprising to astronomers and space agencies of the world because China did these three difficult tasks with just one probe and in the first attempt, orbiting Mars for observation comprehensively, landing on the planet autonomously, and deploying a rover to conduct scientific operations successfully.
Enjoy reading the article and watching a two-minute video to learn about how China accomplished this astonishing space mission.
http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/a/202105/15/WS609f18aaa31024ad0babe089.html
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