Chinese probe Tianwen-2 is traveling 45 million kilometers to touch Earth's quasi-satellite Kamoʻoalewa and bring 100 grams of sample back home.

Chinese probe Tianwen-2 is traveling 45 million kilometers to touch Earth’s quasi-satellite Kamoʻoalewa and bring 100 grams of sample back home.

Written by Douglas Avila

Published on 13/05/2026 at 06:32

Updated on 13/05/2026 at 06:33

1 person reacted to this.

Orbital insertion planned for June 7 and sample collection between July 4 and April 2027

The Chinese probe Tianwen-2 Kamoʻoalewa is weeks away from making history. After 12 months of travel and 45 million kilometers covered, it will touch Earth’s quasi-satellite and collect at least 100 grams of material.

The schedule was confirmed on April 17, 2026, by the China National Space Administration. Liu Yunfeng, deputy director of CNSA’s engineering department, spoke during China Space Day.

According to the official Chinese statement, the mission is now entering its most delicate phase. Orbital insertion is planned for June 7, 2026.

ARTICLE CONTINUES BELOW

See also

The Long March 3B rocket lifted off on May 28, 2025, at 17:31 UTC. The launch took place at the Xichang Satellite Launch Center in China’s Sichuan province.

As reported by Wikipedia, the probe is in healthy condition. It is the third asteroid sample return mission in history, after Japan’s Hayabusa and Hayabusa2 and America’s OSIRIS-REx.

Thus, China enters the select club of three space powers capable of collecting extraterrestrial material. But the Chinese mission adds something unprecedented: after returning the capsule, the probe continues its journey to a comet.

Tianwen 2 Kamooalewa probe approaches Earth's quasi-satellite asteroid, CNSA illustration — Tianwen-2’s approach to the Kamoʻoalewa asteroid, CNSA illustration reference

What is the Kamoʻoalewa asteroid that Tianwen-2 will visit

Tianwen 2 Kamoʻoalewa’s target is a small and rare body. It is between 40 and 100 meters in diameter, according to the International Astronomical Union’s technical record.

It rotates on its own axis every 28 minutes. This rate is ten times faster than most main-belt asteroids.

Kamoʻoalewa was discovered on April 27, 2016, by the PanSTARRS telescope, installed in Haleakalā, Hawaii. The Hawaiian name means “oscillating fragment”.

That’s why the asteroid entered the group of Earth’s seven quasi-satellites. It’s not a moon, but it orbits the Sun with a period almost identical to that of our planet.

According to a paper published in Nature Astronomy on April 19, 2023, there is an unusual hypothesis about the body’s origin. Kamoʻoalewa may be a piece of the Moon.

According to Space.com, the asteroid’s spectral composition matches samples from the Apollo 14 mission. The fragment would have been ejected from the Giordano Bruno crater on the far side of the Moon.

Instead of visiting just any asteroid, Tianwen 2 Kamoʻoalewa may be bringing the first sample from a “hidden moon” to Earth.

Chinese probe Tianwen-2 is traveling 45 million kilometers to touch Earth’s quasi-satellite Kamoʻoalewa and bring 100 grams of sample back home.

Orbital insertion planned for June 7 and sample collection between July 4 and April 2027

What is the Kamoʻoalewa asteroid that Tianwen-2 will visit

Engineers want to carve through Africa with a giant canal to bring water from the world’s second-largest river to a dying lake on the edge of the Sahara Desert that has already lost 90% of its water.

A giant brown band visible from space, approximately 8,850 kilometers long, connected Africa to America in the Atlantic Ocean, and satellites revealed that it is neither land nor pollution, but the largest accumulation of seaweed in the world, which broke records in 2025.

Workers were opening a modern road in Dover when they found, 6 meters below the asphalt, a 3,500-year-old boat made of stitched oak and plant fibers.

Instead of burning or burying old tires, an American city is transforming about 2,000 of them into the street itself, paving its first sections with a quieter and more durable rubber asphalt.

In just one cast, fishermen are surprised to capture 14,096 mullets in Bombinhas and close a historic season with 58,000 fish; scene recorded in the Santa Catarina paradise marks the last day of the 2026 season.

Consumers eat six times more chicken than in the 1960s, global meat supply quadruples in 60 years, and FAO report reveals the invisible cost on the plate: livestock could drive 80% of the increase in agricultural emissions over the next decade.

Motorcyclist sees excavator arriving at the edge of a river in Bosnia, calls neighbors in minutes and turns a hydroelectric project into a resistance lasting more than 10 years with five expired concessions.

Brazil put electric vehicles on the streets, but now it’s testing a solution for the side effect: used batteries from BYD buses can gain an additional 5 to 10 years of second life by storing solar energy at Unicamp after 500 cells are analyzed by CPQD.

City Hall of Belo Horizonte calls 300 homeless people for the Bolsa Moradia program

After fighting for 25 years to open one of the largest gold mines in Europe, a Canadian mining company loses a $4.4 billion dispute against Romania due to a historic village, environmental protests, and Roman galleries protected by UNESCO.

Labor shortage: even with an average salary of R$ 8,700, the profession faces a shortage of 359 workers in Brazil and helps explain why radiotherapy is still hindered in cancer treatment in the SUS.

Teams were excavating the port area of Rio for a modern construction when they found, under layers of landfill, a stone wharf buried for 168 years: the 1811 structure became a World Heritage Site and revealed the most important material vestige of the arrival of enslaved Africans to the Americas.