2007 in spaceflight Moon. Japan's Kaguya orbiter, along with the smaller Okina and Ouna relay spacecraft, was launched on 14 September. The spacecraft entered Selenocentric orbit on 3 October. China launched its first Lunar probe, Chang'e 1, on 24 October, with the spacecraft entering Selenocentric orbit on 5 November. In 2009, two satellites launched into highly elliptical Earth orbits in 2007 as part of the THEMIS mission were also sent to the Moon. They are expected to arrive in October 2010. In August, the NASA Phoenix spacecraft was launched towards Mars, followed by the Dawn mission to the Asteroid belt in September. Cassini
Lunar orbit an apolune of and a perilune of . Then the orbit was circularized at around to obtain suitable imagery. Five such spacecraft were launched over a period of thirteen months, all of which successfully mapped the Moon, primarily for the purpose of finding suitable Apollo program landing sites. The most recent was the Lunar Atmosphere and Dust Environment Explorer (LADEE), which became a ballistic impact experiment in 2014. The Apollo program's Command/Service Module (CSM) remained in a lunar parking orbit while the Lunar Module (LM) landed. The combined CSM/LM would first enter an elliptical orbit, nominally by , which was