Chinese Chang’e 3 spacecraft lands on the Moon!

The Chinese Chang’e 3 spacecraft has landed successfully on the Moon: Live: China lands moon probe – China.org.cn Live 

China’s lunar probe Chang’e 3 made a successful landing on the moon on Saturday night, Beijing Time, marking China’s first spacecraft to soft-land on the surface of an extraterrestrial body.

The first image transmitted by the downward-looking camera.

The Yutu (“Jade Rabbit”) rover  will be deployed in a few hours.

Update: The landing occurred about an hour earlier than expected from press reports.  Here is a video of an English Chinese TV broadcast at the time of the landing:

Update 2:  This article and video describe the lander and rover in some detail: Crossover: 720 seconds of Chang´e-3 moon landing CCTV News – CNTV English

Update 3: Emily Lakdawalla at the Planetary Society has lots of good stuff about the event including the following sequence of images below that were sent during the landing: Chang’e 3 has successfully landed on the Moon! – The Planetary Society

Chang'e 3 lands on the Moon

CCTV

And here is a color image as well:

Image of the lunar surface from Chang'e 3 lander

 Image of the lunar surface from Chang’e 3 lander