DHAKA: A space module carrying China’s first lunar rover landed on the moon on Saturday, state television showed, the first soft landing on the moon in nearly four decades and a major step for the emerging superpower`s ambitious space programme.

Scientists burst into applause as a computer generated image representing the spacecraft was seen landing on the moon’s surface via screens at a Beijing control centre, state broadcaster China Central Television (CCTV) showed, 12 days after Chang’e-3 blasted off on a Long March-3B carrier rocket, reports The Straits Times.

China is set to become just the third country to carry out a moon rover mission, following the United States and former Soviet Union, which also made the last soft landing on the moon 37 years ago.

The probe touched down on an ancient 400km wide plain known in Latin as Sinus Iridum, or The Bay of Rainbows.

BDST: 2050 HRS, DEC 14, 2013
Edited by: Robab Rosan, Current Affairs Editor