The mission HAKUTO-R Mission 1 Of ispace she would be the first fully private to land on the Luna. An opportunity to show how private individuals can compete and (sometimes) surpass state space agencies in achieving high-level scientific results. We had already written about it in the past and today there was a not exactly positive epilogue.
Landing on a celestial body is always very complicated and one must not be influenced by NASA’s successes (with Perseverance and Curiosity, for example). Also there Luna it is a hostile environment and therefore the chances of failure are high, as well as success to the lander HAKUTO-R and its payloads. This will not stop space exploration or future private missions which represent a significant turning point in the panorama of the space-related market. This is what we currently know.
ispace’s HAKUTO-R lander did not land on the moon
The first part of the mission went smoothly over the past few weeks. The launch took place on 11 December 2022 at 8:38 (Italian time) from Space Launch Complex 40 thanks to a Falcon 9 space rocket Of SpaceX. The choice was to reach the Moon with a non-direct trajectory thus avoiding the need for high energies but rather a slower but also less complex arrival.
Although the phases prior to the possible moon landing had been carried out correctly, something is “gone wrong” right at the final moment. At present we do not know if actually the lander didn’t land correctly, but ispace tried to contact him for about 20 minutes with no response. This should mean that unfortunately the vehicle and payload were destroyed on impact.
Japanese private company he has declared in a press release that “ispace, a global lunar exploration company, announced today that the HAKUTO-R mission 1 lunar lander was scheduled to land on the surface of the Moon at 1:40 AM JST on April 26, 2023. At this time The HAKUTO mission control center -R in Nihonbashi, Tokyo, was unable to confirm the success of the Lunar Lander. ispace engineers and mission operations specialists in the Mission Control Center are currently working to confirm the current status of the lander. Read more about the status of the lander will be announced as soon as they become available”.
Some speculation indicate how the lander actually landed but something subsequently went differently than expected, perhaps due to a too rapid descent and a subsequent bounce on the surface causing catastrophic damage to the systems.
Among the latest data are reported one speed Of 30 km/h to one quota Of 80 meters. The signal was then lost and therefore the engineers are trying to understand what could have happened (at present the mission could not be concluded even if the probabilities are rather remote). With the possible loss of the lander also lost was the first UAE rover known as Rashid, among others.