LAUNCH OF CHANG’E-4 FAR SIDE LUNAR LANDER/ROVER, Dec 7, 2018, 1:30 pm ET

Updated December 7:  The launch time is expected to be about 1:30 (not 2:30) pm ET.

Updated December 4:  China has officially announced that the launch is on December 8 Beijing Time.  Andrew Jones tweeted that it will be at 02:30 December 8 in China, which is December 7 18:30 Universal Time, or December 7 2:30 pm Eastern Standard Time.  It is not clear if China will provide any live coverage of the launch.  If it does, it will probably be on CGTN.

Original Entry:  China has not made an official announcement, but Andrew Jones of gbtimes.com, who closely follows the Chinese space program, reports that the launch of the Chang’e-4 far side lunar lander/rover may take place on December 7, 2018 ET.

The time has not been announced, but he expects it to be “early December 8 Beijing time (late December 7 Universal Time).”  Eastern Standard Time is 5 hours behind Universal Time (also known as GMT or UTC or Zulu), so that would be somewhere around dinnertime on the East Coast.

We will post new information if/when it becomes available.  Follow Andrew on Twitter @AJ_FI or go to the gbtimes website to read his reporting.  If China makes an announcement, it will probably be via Xinhua or CGTN.

This will be the first spacecraft to land on the far side of the Moon, which always points away from Earth.  China launched a communications relay satellite, Queqiao, earlier this year to enable mission controllers to communicate with the lander.