China launched a lunar test probe to the moon and back Friday testing advanced systems for its much-anticipated 2018 Chang'e 5 lunar sample recovery mission.

The lunar probe sent into space from Xichang Satellite Launch Center was an updated backup probe for the December 2013 Chang'e 3 mission. Eagerly followed in China and the world, the Jade Rabbit, as it was called, became the first Chinese spacecraft to land on the moon and return to Earth.

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All systems were go at Xichang Friday with state-run Xinhua News Agency reporting that the spacecraft successfully detached from its Long March 3C carrier rocket and achieved the planned orbit. It's scheduled to return to Earth around November 1.

Unlike other much-ballyhooed space launches, there was no live televised takeoff of the probe, which is testing highly experimental systems Chinese space officials say are needed for Chang'e 5.

The probe carries a wide array of newly designed instrumentation related to location reporting, soft landing and takeoff technology and radiation detection. It also featured something old, a radio beacon for better message transmission capability and carried an European Space Agency payload.

The test probe weighed 31 pounds arriving at Xichang last August. Once it finishes with the lunar surface, the probe will hurtle through space at 25,000 miles per hour on its way home.

After the U.S. and Russia, China is the third nation to land on the moon. Three previous Chinese lunar probes, however, haven't attempted to recover lunar samples before returning to Earth.

Spacecraft designs and other clues have led to speculation China's major space aim is to land a man on the Moon.

Chinese officials, up to and including President Xi Jinping, haven't acknowledged that aim, but the new lunar mission program logo features two prominent footprints smack dab in the middle of the Chinese character for "Moon."

Even more telling may be engineering of the Chang'e 5 mission. The capsule being tested on Friday's flight for the Chang'e 5 is a scaled-down replica of the Shenzhou-10 capsule that carried three Chinese astronauts into orbit in June 2013.

Tagsmoon, mission, china's, lunar, NASA, xichang, european space agency, Chang'e-5