Chang'e-4 farside landing mission Options

[Explorer1]

LRO could fly over the site again to clear things up, eventually?

[Phil Stooke]

Yes, for location and possibly visible tracks, but not for details of day-night stops etc. along the traverse.

Phil

[Phil Stooke]

Tomorrow Von Karman crater will cross the terminator and the sun will rise for Yutu 2 on its 50th lunar day. The sun will set just before the end of the year. We have had no news for several months but as you know I am a glass-half-full type of chap and my sunny outlook leads me to hope that the combination of a nice round number (50) and the end of a year will shake something loose. Anything to permit a map update!

Phil

[Phil Stooke]

The sun will set soon (24 hours after I post this) at the end of lunar day 50.

Recap... we had details up to day 43, then silence for 3 days, and it turned out this was because they stood down while Queqiao was having some problems and the team were developing a new approach to operating it. There was a bit of detail about day 46, but since then, nothing. The chances are that this current silence is related to that same issue. I think that's more likely than Yutu 2 breaking down, though it's just as likely to bring us to the end of the mission. I hope for news as we wrap up day 50 and the end of 2022.

Phil

[Phil Stooke]

https://twitter.com/CNSpaceflight/status/1610146643432861696

This tweet repeats information in Chinese media today and includes a distance for the end of lunar day 50 (and the 4th anniversary of landing): 1455 m. That implies some pretty good drives each month since the last figures we had. But no map yet. I am not certain that the figure can be relied on yet but will keep looking for more details.

Phil

[Nordren]

Route map for Day 50

Attached thumbnail(s)

 

[Phil Stooke]

Excellent! Andrew Jones tweeted it here:

https://twitter.com/AJ_FI/status/1610254052629090304

and here is a Chinese source with a larger file:

https://weibo.com/5616492130/MmCyu9HWe?laye...853914262313854


I will be updating my map soon.

Also:

"The latest news from China's lunar exploration project; as of now, the Yutu-2 lunar rover has worked on the back of the moon for 1461 earth days, and has traveled a total of 1410.9 meters."

(from the China Aerospace Weibo)

so the distance given earlier is suspect.



Phil

[Phil Stooke]

The sun is up in Von Karman crater for day 51.

Phil

[Phil Stooke]

https://finance.sina.com.cn/tech/roll/2023-...mm2108522.shtml

This site has some new images and a new map for day 50. Some of the images are taken on different days.

\Phil

[Phil Stooke]

Sunset for Yutu 2 at the end of day 51. It might be a few months before we get an update.

Phil

[Phil Stooke]

We are about at the beginning of day 53, but no news yet.

Phil

[Phil Stooke]

It's easy to lose track of what is happening on the Moon with Chang'e 4 and Yutu 2. No updates for a while. We are in the middle of the 54th lunar day. We might get an update next week at an event in China. I will report anything I see.

Phil

[Phil Stooke]

No... nothing yet. Day 54 just ended with sunset yesterday. Keeping my eyes open for news.

Phil

[Phil Stooke]

First quarter Moon over Dallas Road means sunset in von Karman crater at the end of day 55. Ever the optimist, I am now working on the hypothesis that details will be announced every 5 lunar days, i.e. now. Well, you have to believe in something.

Phil

[Phil Stooke]

Well, that didn't happen. As you know there has been absolutely nothing out of China about Yutu 2 for 6 months. But it suddenly occurred to me - I can use LRO to track it. LRO images the site frequently and sure enough there are new images. Here are two from January and February, one from Quickmap and one from a raw image. Yutu 2 is a dark spot at the middle of each image. One of them shows tracks as well.

Phil