US private lunar lander ends mission after tipping over on Moon

New York: The mission of US company Intuitive Machines’ lunar lander Athena has come to an early end because the lander tipped over while touching down on the Moon, and its battery quickly drained, the company said.

According to NASA, the uncrewed lander landed at a region near the Moon’s South Pole at about 11:30 a.m. Eastern Time Thursday, more than 400 meters from its intended landing site, Xinhua news agency reported.

The mission, codenamed IM-2, landed closer to the lunar South Pole than any previous lander, said NASA.

Intuitive Machines said images collected later confirmed the lander was on its side, preventing it from fully operating NASA’s lunar drill and other instruments before its batteries were depleted.

Among the data collected by the lander, NASA’s PRIME-1 (Polar Resources Ice Mining Experiment 1) suite, which includes the lunar drill known as TRIDENT (The Regolith and Ice Drill for Exploring New Terrain), successfully demonstrated the hardware’s full range of motion in the harsh environment of space, NASA said.

With the direction of the Sun, the orientation of the solar panels, and extreme cold temperatures in the crater, Athena was not able to recharge, according to Intuitive Machines. The company said the mission has concluded and teams are continuing to assess the data collected throughout the mission. The southern pole region on the Moon where Athena landed is lit by harsh sun angles and limited direct communication with the Earth. This area has been avoided due to its rugged terrain.

Intuitive Machines said it believes the insights and achievements from Athena’s mission will open this region for further space exploration.

“While this mission didn’t achieve all of its objectives for NASA, the work that went into the payload development is already informing other agency and commercial efforts,” said Clayton Turner, associate administrator for space technology, NASA Headquarters.

Intuitive Machines is one of the leading service providers in NASA’s Commercial Lunar Payload Services initiative, part of the agency’s lunar exploration efforts. Under the initiative, NASA is working with multiple American companies to send NASA science investigations and technology demonstrations to the Moon.

Last year, Intuitive Machines made history when its first lunar lander, Odysseus, made a soft touchdown on the lunar surface. It marked the first American spacecraft to land on the lunar surface in more than 50 years.

However, Odysseus also tripped over its own feet during its final descent on the Moon, and its mission ended earlier than expected. Intuitive Machines has two more deliveries for NASA in the future, with its IM-3 mission slated for 2026, and IM-4 mission for 2027.

–IANS