In a historic achievement, the Chinese probe sends the first images of the dark side of the moon

BEIJING (Reuters) - China achieved a historic milestone in the United States and Russia this morning, successfully sending a probe to the far side of the moon.

But first, it should be pointed out that there is no dark side to the Moon despite the fame of the term known as that aspect. Rather, it is the expression of the far side or the unseen side of the moon, according to the astronomer at the Qatar Star Search Program at Hamad bin Khalifa University, Hani Al - Dalea.

He explained that the near side (facing the earth) and the remote side both may be dark and may be illuminated according to their location of the sun, when the moon is cleared the side facing the earth is dark and the remote side lit.

He stressed in an interview with Al Jazeera that this Chinese achievement is the first humanitarian achievement because no one has landed or any spacecraft on that distant face, although the spacecraft have already taken pictures of that face, while the United States was able to put human in the side Near the moon during Apollo flights between 1969 and 1972.

It is known that the moon faces the Earth one side always, as it revolves around the same speed of rotation around the Earth, so the far side of it can not be seen at all from the ground.

As for how the Chinese were able to communicate with the probe and send pictures to Earth from that side, he explained that in May 2018, China had placed an artificial satellite in the orbit of the moon 60,000 kilometers from its far side to act as a contact point between Earth and the probe Zhang Ah- 4.

The probe's tasks include examining the environment on the far side of the moon to see why the soil's quality varies from that side to the near side, and why the nozzles are packed on the far side compared to the opposite side of the globe. The probe also carries seeds to experiment with growing vegetables in a closed environment on the moon.

In addition, the remote face is characterized by radio quietness - according to the bishop - compared to the near-Earth face, so the probe carries with it a radio telescope to study some celestial bodies, and will also provide important information to study the origins of the stars and development of the nebula.

With this achievement, China has become the first nation to land on the far side of the moon as part of an ambitious space program of decades to come, which it hopes will become a major space power by 2030 and plans to start building its own manned space station next year.