Mars landing

[Huey]

Congratulation to China and the Chinese team who achieved landing on the Red Planet on their first go.
I'm looking forward to new scientific discoveries from China's space and planet exploration.

Huey

[Merlin66]

+1 from me.
They have done a wonderful job.

[glend]

Oh, this will get interesting now. Being the first is certainly harder. Looking at their rover, it seems to be much like the old NASA ones. Still it is an achievement to get the thing down on the ground in one piece. As to the intent, certainly it is a demonstration, but I doubt Elon Musk is too worried, although they are knocking off the Starship design now.

[Zuts]

You are joking?

1. It's a part of mars that hasn't been explored before, they are all searching for life and it is actually a whole planet.
2. Do you know what scientific packages they have?
3. You have to start somewhere...
4. The Europeans have tried it a number of times and have not succeeded, so quite an achievement.

Just wow, why would you belittle it?

[Merlin66]

Hope you feel the same towards the UK lander......
https://www.airbus.com/space/space-exploration/exomars.html

[drylander]

If all this moon/ mars exploration stuff by the chinese how can they still be classified as a developing nation in regards to climate change targets? How many other 'developing' nations can afford to spend so much on space exploration?
Pete

[Merlin66]

Fair question. I don’t know the criteria being applied, but India has also sent an orbiter to Mars.

[multiweb]

In the case of China exploration means colonisation. ;) Plenty of time though. China sea, Taiwan ... space is at the end of the TODO list.

[glend]

It's a bit like Antarctica, they obviously see a benefit in being a "player" at the table.

[AndyG]

With your fair points aside, I'd just say this is a flag planting exercise. In fact, in a way, it always has been, by everyone concerned. I respect (if not revere) the scientists who achieve this work, but they are not the ones paying the bills. Their achievements are by the grace of those holding the purse strings, who will get what they want.





As Marc said. Except most countries can execute their TODO's in parallel.