By: Theodore Tong

On June 25, 2024, China’s Chang’e 6 brought back soil samples of the moon’s far side.

The Chang’e 6 is named after a Moon goddess from Chinese stories. It took off from Hainan, a place in southern China, on May 3, 2024. After traveling for about a month, it landed on the Moon on June 2, 2024, in a huge crater called the South Pole-Aitken basin.

When Chang’e 6 landed, it planted a Chinese flag made from Moon rock. Then it used a drill and a robotic arm to collect Moon rocks and soil, then took lots of pictures of the Moon. On June 4, 2024, a special rocket carried the Moon samples back to the Chang’e 6 orbiter, which then sent the samples in a capsule back to Earth.

The capsule, with about four pounds of Moon rocks, landed safely in Inner Mongolia on June 25, 2024. It was taken to the China Academy of Space Technology in Beijing. Some of the rocks will stay in China, and some will go to scientists around the world.

These Moon rocks might help scientists learn why the far side of the Moon is so different from the side we see from Earth. They could also teach us about the early solar system.

China plans more Moon missions in the future. Chang’e 7 and Chang’e 8 will launch in 2026 and 2028 to look for water. By 2030, China might even send astronauts to the Moon and build a base there.