China experimental moon orbiter returns after 8- day trip

China has successfully recovered an experimental spacecraft that flew around the moon and back in a test run for the country’s first unmanned return trip to the lunar surface.

The eight-day trip that ended early on Saturday marked the first time in almost four decades that a spacecraft has returned to Earth after travelling around the moon. China plans to send a spacecraft to the moon in 2017 and have it return to Earth after collecting soil samples.

If successful, that would make China only the third country after the United States and Russia to carry out such a mission.

China’s lunar exploration program has already launched a pair of orbiting lunar probes and in 2013 landed a craft on the moon with a rover onboard.