Chang'e-2 enters Lunar Orbit

China's second lunar probe entered the moon's orbit on Saturday, eight days after the Long March 3C rocket carrying the Chang'e-2 blasted off from the launch centre, state media reported.

The unmanned probe will start "scientific exploration activities soon," said the official Xinhua news agency, citing the Beijing Aerospace Control Center.

The Chang'e-2 will first circle the moon at a distance of 100 kilometres (62 miles). The plan is for it to drop into orbit 15 kilometres from the moon's surface.

It will conduct various tests over a six-month period in preparation for the expected launch in 2013 of the Chang'e-3, which China hopes will be its first unmanned landing on the moon.

The Chang'e programme, named after a mythical Chinese goddess who flew to the moon, is seen as an effort to put China's space exploration programme on a par with those of the United States and Russia.

The first lunar probe, launched in October 2007, was in orbit for 16 months.

Beijing hopes to bring a moon rock sample back to earth in 2017, with a manned mission pencilled in for around 2020, according to state media.

China's Lunar Probe Chang'e 2 launched

Long March 3C rocket carrying China's second unmanned lunar probe, Chang'e II, lifts off from the launch pad at the Xichang Satellite Launch Center in southwest China's Sichuan Province, at 18:59:57 (Beijing time) on Oct. 1, 2010. (Xinhua/Li Gang)

China's second unmanned lunar probe, Chang'e-2, was maneuvered to correct its trajectory on the earth-moon transfer orbit Saturday.

Scientists successfully activated the attitude control engines on Chang'e-2 and trimmed the satellite for the first time on its journey, according to a flight control official in Beijing.

"During Chang'e-2's 380,000-km journey to the moon, we will conduct more orbit corrections if necessary to ensure that it enters a lunar orbit," said Ma Yongping, vice director of the flight control center.

Chang'e-2 blasted off on a Long-March-3C carrier rocket from the Xichang Satellite Launch Center, in southwest China's Sichuan Province, at about 7 p.m. Friday.

It is China's first unmanned spacecraft to be boosted from the launch site directly to the earth-moon transfer orbit, greatly reducing the journey time from that of its predecessor Chang'e-1.

Chang'e-1 took about 13 days to travel to a lunar orbit after orbiting the earth in a geosynchronous orbit and then transferring to the earth-moon transfer orbit.

Chang'e-2 is expected to travel for about 112 hours, or almost five days, to arrive in a lunar orbit.

To acquire more detailed moon data, Chang'e-2 will enter a lower lunar orbit about 100 km above the surface, compared with the 200-km altitude of Chang'e-1, according to the control center.

The satellite will eventually be maneuvered into an orbit just 15 kilometer above the moon. At that point, Chang'e-2 will take pictures of moon's Bay of Rainbows area, the proposed landing ground for Chang'e-3, with a resolution of 1.5 meters.

The resolution on Chang'e-1's camera was 120 meters, said Wu Weiren, chief designer of China's lunar orbiter project.