China’s Mars probe travels more than 400 million km
Beijing, Jan 3: The China National Space Administration (CNSA) announced on Sunday that the country’s Mars probe Tianwen-1 has travelled more than 400 million km and is expected to enter the Red Planet’s orbit next month.
As of 6 a.m. on Sunday, the probe had flown in space for 163 days and was about 130 million km from Earth and about 8.3 million km from Mars, reports Xinhua news agency. According to the CNSA, the probe is functioning stably and is scheduled to slow down before entering Mars orbit in more than a month and preparing itself to land on the Red Planet.
Since its launch on July 23, 2020, the Mars probe has captured an image showing both Earth and the Moon, as well as taking several selfies. It has carried out three orbital corrections, a deep-space manoeuver and self-checks on multiple payloads.
The Tianwen-1 probe, weighing about five tonnes, consists of an orbiter, a lander and a rover.
It is designed to complete orbiting, landing and roving in one mission. After entering the Mars orbit, it will spend two to three months surveying potential landing sites, using a high-resolution camera to prepare for the landing in May.
The most challenging part of the mission will be the soft landing, an autonomous process of the probe lasting seven to eight minutes, according to the CNSA. (IANS)
Ethiopia deploys planes, helicopters to fight locust invasion
Addis Ababa, Jan 3: The Ethiopian government has deployed airplanes and helicopters in its fight against a recent locust invasion, an official said here.
On Saturday, Abera Lemma, Public Relations Director at Ethiopia Ministry of Agriculture (MoA), said the aircraft were being used to assess the extent of the invasionm as well as to spray chemicals on locust affected areas, reports Xinhua news agency.
Lemma said the planes and choppers were being deployed in areas located in Ethiopia’s Southern, Oromia and Somali regions hit hardest by the locust invasion.
Lemma further said there are plans to initiate a community-led campaign to fight the locust invasion which crossed to Ethiopia from neighbouring Somalia.
The MoA has dispatched dozens of experts to help with the efforts to battle the locust invasion which is threatening tens of hectares of agricultural lands.
According to the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), Ethiopia suffered the worst locust outbreak in 25 years in 2020.
Since January 2020, swarms of desert locusts damaged over 200,000 hectares of cropland in Ethiopia affecting the food security of millions of people, the FAO added.
Each square kilometre of a swarm can have from 40 million-80 million locusts. (IANS)