Moon Landing Fails Aga
Last Thursday, the Japanese company, iSpace, attempted to land their lunar robot Resilience on the moon but failed. They were originally inspired by a 20 million dollar competition, but they still plan on launching more missions.
In 2007, Google announced a competition for private companies to invent, build, and land a robot on the surface of the moon. Once it reached the destination, it would have to travel 500 meters and send high-quality images and videos back to Earth. The grand prize was 20 million USD, but reaching significant milestones also received millions. No one ever won because no one had finished the challenge before it shut down in 2018 due to reaching the date Google planned to cause it to expire. Even though no one can win money, iSpace is still trying to complete
first mission was named Hakuto-R M1, named after a rabbit in Japanese mythology. The lander transported 2 other robots: the rover Rashid and robot failed when trying to land in Mare Frigor, a basalt plain on the moon, in April of 2023, when the altitude sensor calculated the height too low. As a result, the engines stopped high above the ground and everything smashed to the ground.
The second mission, Hakuto-R M2, launche the lunar lander Resilience in January this year. It only carried one rover named Tenacious. The plan was for it to explore the plains around the landing point and collect lunar soil to sell to NASA. Around 3 am on June 5th, Mission Control told the robot to begin landing. Just a few minutes before reaching the ground, they lost all communications with it. It is not likely that anyone will ever be able to connect to it again because the entire piece of technology probably was destroyed. The problem was, once again, the altitude sensor. This time it didn’t send wrong information, but instead there was a large enough delay between reading and sending the data that the computer thought the lander was farther above the ground than it actually was. Because of the lag, Resilience could not slow down in time for a safe landing speed. This mission was also unsuccessful.
Even after having their work destroyed twice, iSpace is now designing another lunar lander that will hopefully accomplish their mission. It is named Apex 1.0 and is projected to launch in 2027.