Photo of Mars by China’s Tianwen 1 Spaceprobe

China’s Tianwen-1 spaceprobe was launched in July 2020, and it has sent back this amazing first image of Mars from about 2.2 million km (1.4 million miles) away from the planet. The mission is preparing to enter Mars’ orbit on Wednesday, February 10, 2021, and is expected to land on the Red Planet in May, in a massive impact basin known as Utopia. Tianwen-1 includes a Mars orbiter, a lander and a rover that will study martian soil.

(Read In 2021 Mars Will Have Three New Visitors)

The spacecraft ignited one of its engines to “make an orbital correction” “and was expected to slow down before being captured by Martian gravity” around February 10, the agency said.

This photo was released Friday, February 5, 2021 by the China National Space Administration. It shows geological features such as the Schiaparelli crater and the Valles Marineris, a vast stretch of canyons on the planet’s surface.

China has already sent space mission Chang’e 4 to the Moon, and achieved humanity’s first soft landing on the far side of the Moon, when it landed Yutu-2 on January 3, 2019 – following from Chang’e 3, the first Chinese landing on the Moon

Image: China National Space Administration

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Saima Baig

I am a Chartered Environmentalist from the Royal Society for the Environment, UK and co-owner of DoLocal Digital Marketing Agency Ltd, with a Master of Environmental Management from Yale University, an MBA in Finance, and a Bachelor of Science in Physics and Mathematics. I am passionate about science, history and environment and love to create content on these topics.