CHINA'S lunar probe Chang'e 1 finished its first orbital correction this morning, the Beijing Aerospace Control Center said.

The correction was the second scheduled one for the country's first moon probe after it skipped a planned orbital correction yesterday as the orbiter was right on its planned trajectory to enter the lunar orbit, Xinhua news agency reported.

The orbital correction is meant to adjust the orbit's position in the middle of a space journey as lunar probes have often been lost in space due to imprecise positioning and speed.

The probe, named after a mythical Chinese goddess who flew to the moon, is expected to be subject to another orbital correction during its five-day trip in the Earth-moon orbit before it starts to fly to the moon.

The satellite is estimated to enter the orbit which is close enough for it to be captured by the moon's gravity and became its satellite at 11:25am next Monday.

Chang'e 1 completed its fourth orbital transfer at 5:15pm on Wednesday and entered the Earth-moon transfer orbit, a critical point that determines whether the satellite can fly to the moon successfully.

The orbiter has broken the country's space exploration record by traveling farther from the planet than any other domestic orbiter after it roamed to the apogee of 120,000 km at 5:40pm on Tuesday.

The satellite opened its ultraviolet image sensors about 7am on Tuesday and began work collecting information on the Earth, the report said.

The images will be transmitted back to the Earth when it enters lunar orbit, the report said.

Chang'e 1 blasted off on a Long March3A carrier rocket at 6:05pm last Wednesday from the Xichang Satellite Launch Center in the southwestern province of Sichuan, marking the first step of China's three-stage moon mission, which will lead to a moon landing and launch of a moon rover around 2012.

The satellite will relay the first picture of the moon in late November and will then continue scientific exploration of the moon for a year.

In the third phase of the country's moon mission, another rover will land on the moon and return to Earth with lunar soil and stone samples in about 2017.