The rivalry between China and the United States will heat up this summer as the two countries send rovers to Mars. The Tianwen-1 spacecraft will take off on a Long March 5 rocket in July or August and is expected to reach Mars in February, Bao Weimin, head of the Science and Technology Committee of the China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation, the space programme’s contractor, told state broadcaster CCTV. A ground rover would then be released to explore the Martian surface. It appears that China’s trek to the red planet is not being hampered by the Covid-19 outbreak, the economic downturn or growing tensions with the US. Ozan Varol blindly applied for a job that didn’t exist by emailing Steve Squyres (he was in charge of a @NASA funded project to send a rover to Mars). And got the job. He acted on his dad’s advice, “you can’t win the lottery if you don’t buy a ticket.” https://t.co/V5TVTG7UDf — Ryan Hawk (@RyanHawk12) May 31, 2020 China’s National Space Administration has just announced that the program to put a Chinese stamp on the red planet will go ahead, with preparations progressing well toward the first launch, likely from the southern province of Hainan in July or August, when the two planets are closest to each other. NASA: Special air delivery! ✈️ The NASAPersevere team at NASAKennedy received the tubes tasked with holding the first samples collected at Mars for eventual return to Earth. Progress continues to speed along as the rover readies for launch this summer: … pic.twitter.com/gvGBmHfWwB — Chad Franzen WSAW (@Chad_WSAW) May 24, 2020 China has a number of plans to expand its space exploration efforts, including development and launch of an orbital research platform, its own space station above Earth, by 2022. The nation’s space program also recently test-launched a new crew spacecraft, which will eventually be used in its mission to land Chinese astronauts on the surface of the Moon. Meanwhile, NASA has issued a new set of draft rules that it is proposing for continued international cooperation in space, particularly as they related to reaching the Moon and setting up a more permanent human presence on Earth’s natural satellite. The agency is also hoping to return human space launch capabilities to the U.S. this week with a first demonstration launch of astronauts aboard SpaceX’s Crew Dragon spacecraft on Wednesday.