Beijing, May 3 -- China's Long March-5 Y8 carrier rocket has successfully launched the Chang'e-6 lunar probe into the Earth-Moon transit orbit, the China National Space Administration (CNSA) said on Friday.
Earlier in the day, a Sputnik correspondent reported that the Chinese carrier rocket Long March-5 Y8 with the Chang'e-6 lunar probe was launched from the Wenchang Space Launch Site on Hainan Island. The launch took place as scheduled at 5:27 p.m. local time (09:27 GMT).
"The probe precisely entered the Earth-Moon transit orbit. The launch is considered successful," the space administration said in a statement.
The entire mission, which is expected to return about 2 kilogrammes (4.4 pounds) of soil samples to Earth, will take 53 days, ...