China aims for the moon

All seems set for China to launch its first lunar probe in the next hours, the Chinese state run news agency Xinhua held.

If all goes to plan, China will be the third nation to manage a soft landing on the moon, after sending its first astronaut in space ten years ago. The United States and the Soviet Union have achieved this feat in the past. However unlike its predecessors, the Chinese probe will first survey the moon's landscape to determine the safest landing spot. Observers held an impact crater known as Sinus Iridum, or the Bay of Rainbows, is the most probable landing site.

Launched off a Long March 3B rocket in the Sichuan province, southwest of China, the Chang'e-3 probe is expected to land on the moon's surface in mid-December.

After landing, the spacecraft will dispatch a six-wheeled lunar rover named Jade Rabbit. The vehicle is equipped with four cameras and two mechanical legs allowing it to dig and collect soil samples. The slow-moving research vehicle will stay on the moon's surface for at least three months.

Meanwhile American scientists have voiced their concerned claiming the Chinese mission could interfere with a NASA study of the moon's dust environment. The Chinese rover might generate a plume of dust on the moon's surface that could ruin the results of NASA's Lunar Atmosphere and Dust Environment Explorer.