China's “Jade Rabbit” or Yu Tu rover landed on Moon Saturday Dec 14,2013

China on Saturday Dec 14,2013 for the first time landed a rover on the Moon — the first country to do so since 1976 — marking a landmark for the country’s fast-developing space programme

A lunar probe carrying the “Jade Rabbit” or Yu Tu rover landed in the Bay of Rainbows, or Sinus Iridum, on the Moon’s surface, 12 days after the Chang’e-3 probe — the country’s third major lunar mission — blasted off from southwestern China

The Beijing Aerospace Control Center said the probe had landed “successfully”, with China becoming the third country after the United States and the erstwhile Soviet Union to achieve a “soft landing”

The rover will spend the next few weeks exploring the lunar surface

Note

The mission highlights the rapid advancements in China’s space programme, following two lunar missions, in 2007 and 2010, which saw the country carrying out a hard impact landing and mapping the Moon’s surface. 

India (Chandrayaan-1 probe) and the European Space Agency have carried out similar hard landings.