The meetings at the United States and the Chinese space agencies conceded an agreement at the 56th session of Scientific Technology Subcommittee meeting of UN Committee of Peaceful Uses of Outer Space meeting in Vienna, Austria to release the findings publicly, from 11-22 February. In a press release on Friday, NASA said:
Last month, NASA discussed with the China National Space Administration (CNSA) to explore the possibility of observing the signature of the landing pad of their lunar lander, Chang & # 4 and 4, using the LRO tool of the LAMP: Science has gathered on how the moon dust is ejected to the top during the landing of a spacecraft could inform future missions and how they arrive on the lunar surface.
The statement by NASA stressed on the point that any joint operation with China would be “mutual, transparent, and mutually beneficial”, in accordance with the guidelines of Congress and Trump administration.
I see you and you see me! Chang'e-4 and Yutu-2 take pictures of each other on the far side of the Moon #ChangE4 pic.twitter.com/QUZBFJhapQ
— China Xinhua News (@XHNews) January 11, 2019
According to the published reports, an American law demands NASA to get advanced approval of any cooperation efforts it intends to do with Beijing on the space exploration. But that publication gave no denotation that that law would, or would not apply, to next flyover.
Congratulations to China’s Chang’e-4 team for successfully landing on the far side of the Moon! This picture from @LRO_NASA shows the area where the Chang’e 4 touched down. The next opportunity to image the landing site will come at the end of January: https://t.co/ShOFOwyOrv pic.twitter.com/BwGI61NnC9
— Thomas Zurbuchen (@Dr_ThomasZ) January 3, 2019
The Chinese spacecraft Chang & e-4, made the historic landing on the moon on January 3. It sent first images from farthest side of Earth’s natural satellite a few hours later. Located on the north-western side of most known lunar craters, the basin of South Pole-Aitken, the device made its landing in Vom Karman crater. The position of aircraft will allow studying mineral composition of the surface of the moon and also obtaining new data on the mantle of the moon, according to the Chinese scientists.
NASA was not able to pull down the orbit of its lunar vehicle to be in optimal position during the landing of Chinese probe on the dark side of the moon for many reasons. It was said by NASA that the detection of the plume of the dust during January 31 flyover might still be possible.
