The American lunar lander, having failed to reach the Moon due to a fuel leak during the flight, will have to end its mission in a sensational way on Thursday by voluntarily disintegrating in the Earth’s atmosphere.
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Astrobotic, the start-up that designed the device, positioned the lander “for a controlled re-entry” above the water of the South Pacific, it said Thursday on X (formerly Twitter).
The machine, called Peregrine, was still about 30,000 miles (48,000 km) from Earth on Thursday morning, the company said, releasing a photo of the darkened Earth taken by the lunar lander.
The latter took off early last week from Florida, but a fuel leak was immediately detected which prevented it from landing softly on the Moon as planned.
The lander, however, continued to operate in space, collecting flight data useful for a future attempt, and also allowing experiments to be carried out on board, sent in particular by NASA, such as measuring radiation.
But the company also had to evaluate how to conclude the mission taking into account the uncertainties related to the leak, and without risking creating problems for satellites in Earth orbit, or debris in lunar orbit.
The company announced this weekend that it had made “the difficult decision” to maintain a trajectory that headed the lander towards Earth, even though it could possibly continue to operate for “weeks.”
“We do not believe Peregrine’s reentry poses any safety risks and the vessel will burn up in Earth’s atmosphere,” Astrobotic wrote at the time.
The lander is about the size of a small golf car.
The company plans a press conference on Friday to review the entire mission.
Astrobotic would attempt the first American moon landing in more than 50 years, and the first by a private company.
A Japanese mini-spaceship is to try to land on the Moon on the night of Friday to Saturday Japanese time, which would be big news for the country.
2024-01-18 18:22:04
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