The moon turned out to be inhospitable: two vehicles were damaged during descent

The Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) said that so far it is receiving a signal from the lander, which is communicating as expected.

CNN reports that the unmanned Smart Lunar Exploration Lander, or SLIM, landed just after 10:20 a.m. ET Friday (12:20 p.m. Saturday JST), according to telemetry data broadcast live by JAXA.

The lander is currently running on limited battery power, expected to last only a few hours, and the JAXA team is analyzing the data to determine the cause of the solar panel problem and next steps for the lander. The problem with the solar panels may be related to the fact that the spacecraft is not pointing in the intended direction, JAXA officials said.

The hope is that as the moon’s sun angle changes, the solar panel will be able to charge again, but this may take some time and will depend on whether the vehicle can survive the cold lunar night, the team shared during a press conference.

The agency believes the mission met the criteria to be declared a “minimal success” because the spacecraft made a precise and soft landing on the Moon using optical navigation. The lunar landing makes Japan the third country this century—and the fifth in history—to land on the moon.

When asked to rate the SLIM landing operation, JAXA CEO Dr. Hitoshi Kuninaka gave it a “60 out of 100,” also mentioning that he is known for his “harsh comments.”

The team is also working to collect all the scientific data collected by the lander. The lander was able to launch its two lunar rovers, LEV-1 and LEV-2. The LEV-1 rover is propelled by a jumping mechanism and is equipped with wide-angle visible light cameras, science equipment and antennas that allow it to communicate with Earth. And LEV-2, also equipped with cameras, can change shape as it moves across the lunar surface.

The small robotic explorer SLIM, launched in September, has been nicknamed the “Moon Sniper” because it is equipped with new high-precision technology to demonstrate pinpoint landings.

Previous lunar missions have been able to target and reach specific areas many kilometers long, but the SLIM lander targeted a landing pad that extends just 100 meters across. The lander’s smart eyes—a navigation technology based on image matching—quickly photographed the tilted lunar surface during approach and autonomously made adjustments as the spacecraft descended for landing.

The JAXA team is still working to determine the accuracy of SLIM’s landing, which could take up to a month.

The “lunar sniper” was targeting a landing site near the small crater Scioli on a lunar plain called the Sea of ​​Nectar, which was created by ancient volcanic activity and lies south of the Sea of ​​Tranquility, where Apollo 11 landed in 1969. The lander is designed to briefly study rocks in the area that could provide clues to the Moon’s origins.

When meteorites and other objects hit the Moon, they create craters as well as rocky debris that litter the surface. These rocks intrigue scientists because studying them is like looking inside the Moon itself. Minerals and other aspects of rock composition could potentially shed more light on how the Moon formed, CNN explains.

Landing near sloped, rock-strewn areas around craters is a dangerous process that is typically avoided on most missions, but JAXA believes its lander has the technology to allow it to land safely on rocky terrain.

Over the past year, numerous space agencies and countries have attempted to land on the Moon, resulting in both the first historic landing and failures. India became the fourth country – after the United States, the former Soviet Union and China – to achieve a controlled landing on the Moon when its Chandrayaan-3 mission arrived near the Moon’s south pole in August, CNN recalls. Meanwhile, Japanese company Ispace’s lunar module Hakuto-R fell 4.8 kilometers before crashing into the Moon during a landing attempt in April. Russia’s Luna 25 also crash-landed in August during the country’s first attempt to return to the Moon since the collapse of the Soviet Union. Astrobotic Technology’s Peregrine spacecraft, the first American lunar lander to launch in five decades, crashed Thursday after a critical fuel leak made a safe landing on the moon out of the question.

Part of the motivation behind the new lunar space race is the desire to access water trapped as ice in permanently shadowed areas at the moon’s south pole, CNN notes. It could be used for drinking water or fuel as humanity expands the frontiers of space exploration in the future. The region is pockmarked with craters and strewn with rocks, resulting in narrow landing sites.

Meanwhile, after flying hundreds of thousands of miles in space and overcoming a fuel problem that derailed its plans, the US lunar lander Peregrine may have met its fiery end. The spacecraft was projected to end its abbreviated 10-day journey around 4:00 pm ET on Thursday when it crashed into Earth’s atmosphere over a remote area of ​​the South Pacific Ocean, east of Australia.

Pittsburgh-based Astrobotic Technology, which developed the Peregrine lander under contract to NASA, confirmed the spacecraft’s loss, saying it lost contact with the craft moments before its scheduled return time, “indicating that the craft completed a controlled return over an open water in the South Pacific.” However, the company added in a post on social media: “We are awaiting independent confirmation from government agencies.”

NASA and Astrobotic officials are expected to speak publicly about the mission during a press briefing at 1 pm ET on Friday.

The failed mission is a setback for Astrobotic and NASA, whose shared goal is to build a stable pipeline of commercially developed, relatively low-cost lunar landers capable of carrying out robotic missions to the Moon as the space agency works toward a crewed lunar landing later this decade.

The Peregrine lander launched Jan. 8 on a Vulcan Centaur rocket, a new vehicle developed by the United Launch Alliance, a joint venture between Lockheed Martin and Boeing.

The launch went off without a hitch, safely delivering the Sapsan lander into Earth orbit on its way to the Moon. If the spacecraft were to reach the lunar surface, it would be the first US soft-landing mission on the Moon since Apollo 17 in 1972, Peregrine notes.

But a few hours after its independent flight, the Sapsan landing module encountered critical difficulties. Astrobotic confirmed that the spacecraft experienced serious problems with its onboard propulsion systems and suffered a fuel leak, leaving the lander without enough fuel for a soft landing on the Moon.

Astrobotic then changed course. The company has oriented the spacecraft to act more like a satellite, testing its onboard science instruments and other systems as it flies thousands of miles into the void. Ultimately, Astrobotic decided that it would dispose of the craft by crashing into the Earth’s atmosphere at high speed. The loss of the Peregrine lander is a blow to Astrobotic and NASA. The deal struck between the two organizations made the mission possible: NASA committed more than $108 million to help Astrobotic develop it and send five payloads. That price is about 36% higher than the original contract value as the deal is being renegotiated due to pandemic-related supply chain issues, according to Joel Kearns, deputy associate administrator for exploration at NASA’s Science Mission Directorate.

The US space agency does not consider the Peregrine spacecraft as the only option for conducting robotic exploration on the Moon. NASA also has partnerships with three other companies developing robotic lunar landers, including Houston-based Intuitive Machines, which could launch its first mission in mid-February.

A privately owned lunar lander has never safely reached the lunar surface, although other companies have tried. In 2019, a spacecraft built by the Israeli company SpaceIL crashed into the Moon during a landing attempt. Once again in 2023, the Japanese company Ispace lost control of its lander as it approached the lunar surface.