This week China landed a rover on Mars. It seemed to happen without much ceremony, certainly here in the UK.
Its called Zhurong and joins the American motors Curiosity and Perseverance as they trundle over the dust of the Planet Red.
Both superpowers have staked a claim then. Is that how it is?
Here it is, Zhugong, with its lander and ramp and Roger Dean-esque solar panels. What do you think?
I was intrigued to find out the USSR landed also landed a craft on Mars in 1971, which included a small rover on skis. The lander failed and rover never got out. It was called Mars 2.
There have been many, many attempts at landing on Mars, from all countries and most of them have failed for one reason or another. Russia have had several passes at Mars, very few of which were successful. Even the United Arab Emirates, not a country you might associate with space exploration, successfully orbited Mars with a probe recently.
ReplyDeletehttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_missions_to_Mars
Thanks Billster. Would you sign up for a Mars colony? I'll blog that link if that's OK with you. Ta.
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