When China sends astronauts or technology into space, the spacecraft have imaginative names. “Long March” rockets carry probes like the “Moon Goddess” or “Questions to the Sky” into space, which unleash rovers like the “Jade Hare” or the “Fire God” on foreign celestial bodies. But what does it all mean?
When Europe or the US plan space missions, they are often given names taken from ancient Greek or Roman mythology. NASA named its ongoing moon mission after the Greek goddess Artemis, patroness of the hunt and the moon. Europe’s Ariane rockets are named after a Greek goddess of fertility. European space travel is also characterized by great thinkers such as Galileo (Europe’s GPS alternative) and Columbus (ISS research module), in the US they like to give probes names that correspond to their desired properties – the Voyager probes actually became travelers, Mars- robbers were called ‘Curiosity’, ‘Opportunity’ or ‘Perseverance’. China has come up with a slightly different naming scheme, somewhere between ancient mythology and communist nostalgia.
Source: Krone
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