Reports of the Jade Rabbit's death appear to have been greatly exaggerated.

"The Jade Rabbit has come back to life!" a spokesman for China's space agency declared, according to state media Thursday. He was referring to the latest pride of China's ambitious and so far successful space program, the lunar rover named after a long-eared character from Chinese mythology. Its landing in December put China in an exclusive club along with the U.S. and the former Soviet Union as the only nations to put a probe on the moon.

Last month Chinese space-agency officials had said the Jade Rabbit, or Yutu in Chinese, had run into technical difficulties. The setback inspired sympathy and tributes from the rover's admirers online and at least one former starship captain.

Its condition apparently took a turn for the worse on Wednesday, when the semi-official China News Service said that the probe couldn't be woken up. Media outlets dutifully said their farewells.

But apparently the Jade Rabbit still has some hop to it.