SPACE RACE: China Says We will be on Mars by 2020.

Wu Yanhua, deputy chief of the National Space Administration, said Beijing aims to launch its first Mars probe around 2020 to carry out orbiting and roving exploration, followed by a second mission that would include collection of surface samples from the red planet.

She said other plans include sending probes to Jupiter and its moons.

“Our overall goal is that, by around 2030, China will be among the major space powers of the world,” she said.

The Soviet Union achieved its first successful Mars landing in 1971, but the Soft Lander unit failed after relaying just 20 seconds of video. The U.S. followed suit by landing two Viking spacecraft in 1976, and both operated continuously for several years. China last tried to put a spacecraft in orbit around Mars in 2011, in conjunction with a Russian landing craft. However, an orbital failure caused both spacecraft to burn up in the Earth’s atmosphere weeks after the launch.

China seems to have a bit of catching up to do.