China’s Mars Rover Zhurong Seen Exploring the Red Planet in First Photos

Zhurong, the six-wheeled, solar-powered, 240kg Mars rover is expected to spend three months taking photos.

By Agence France-Presse | Updated: 12 June 2021 12:15 IST

China’s Mars Rover Zhurong Seen Exploring the Red Planet in First Photos

Photo Credit: China National Space Administration (CNSA)

Highlights

Zhurong's touchdown in May was a first ever successful probe landing
The rover is named after a mythical Chinese fire god
Zhurong is expected to spend three months taking photos

Solar panel "wings" spread out and two camera "eyes" pointing ahead, China's Mars rover Zhurong struck a birdlike pose as it explored the red planet in photos released by the country's space agency Friday.

Zhurong's touchdown in May was the first ever successful probe landing by any country on its first Mars mission -- a milestone in China's ascent to space superpower status.

The rover, named after a mythical Chinese fire god, has since been studying the topography of a vast Martian lava plain known as the Utopia Planitia.

Samsung Wins Patent for a Tri-Fold Smartphone With Specialised Barrier Layer for Improved Durability

Photos published by the China National Space Administration showed tracks in the red soil left by Zhurong, which the agency described as "China's imprint", after it drove onto the planet's surface form a landing platform adorned with a large Chinese flag.

The six-wheeled, solar-powered, 240-kilogramme (530-pound) Zhurong is expected to spend three months taking photos, harvesting geographical data, and collecting rock samples.

The space agency said on Friday that the Mars mission's "engineering tasks were carried out smoothly as planned," and that the equipment were currently "in good condition."

Mars Trek: Here's What Surface of Red Planet Looks Like

China has now sent astronauts into space, powered probes to the Moon and landed a rover on Mars -- one of the most prestigious of all prizes in the competition for dominion of space.

The United States and Russia are the only other countries to have reached Mars, and only the former has operated a rover on the surface.

Several US, Russian and European attempts to land rovers on Mars have failed in the past, most recently in 2016 with the crash-landing of the Schiaparelli joint Russian-European spacecraft.

The latest successful arrival came in February, when US space agency NASA landed its rover Perseverance, which has since been exploring the planet.

We dive into all things WWDC — iOS 15, iPadOS 15, macOS Monterey, watchOS 8 and more — this week on Orbital, the Gadgets 360 podcast. Orbital is available on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music and wherever you get your podcasts.

Affiliate links may be automatically generated - see our ethics statement for details.

Comments

For the latest tech news and reviews, follow Gadgets 360 on X, Facebook, WhatsApp, Threads and Google News. For the latest videos on gadgets and tech, subscribe to our YouTube channel. If you want to know everything about top influencers, follow our in-house Who'sThat360 on Instagram and YouTube.