Ispace Resilience moon lander's status is unknown
A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket launches from Launch Complex 39 at the Kennedy Space Center on January 15 while sending ispace's Resilience lander and Firefly Aerospace's Blue Ghost lander into space. File Photo by Joe Marino/UPI | License Photo
June 5 (UPI) -- Privately owned Japanese aerospace company ispace has lost communication with its Reliance lander after attempting a remotely controlled landing on the moon Thursday afternoon.
Ispace attempted the moon landing at 3:17 EDT but lost contact with the lander and is trying to re-establish communications to determine its status.
The mission proceeded as expected until losing contact with the Resilience lander immediately prior to touching down on the moon, ispace U.S. subsidiary chairman and former NASA astronaut Ron Garan told CNN.
"I'm not seeing the telemetry," Garan said, "but I'm getting updates on my phone [and] everything was normal."
It's very hard for private-sector aerospace companies to develop the technology needed to successfully put a lander on the moon, he added.
"The reason we are doing this is to learn," Garan said.
The Resilience was scheduled to land on the moon's Mare Figoris region, which is located on the near side of the moon's northern hemisphere.
The about 7.5-foot-tall lander contains a four-wheeled rover named Tenacious for exploring the lunar surface in the moon's unexplored northern region.
The rover contains a high-definition camera, a shovel for collecting lunar samples for NASA and weighs about 11 pounds.
It also contains a tiny red cottage that its builder, Mikael Genberg, named the Moonhouse, which the rover will place on the moon's surface.
A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket on Jan. 15 launched the ispace lander to the moon along with a private Blue Ghost moon lander built by Firefly Aerospace, Space.com reported.
The Blue Ghost touched down on the Mare Crisium region of the moon on March 2.
The Resilience mission took much longer to reach the moon due to a low-energy transfer path that ispace chose for its lander, which arrived in orbit around the moon on May 6.
The livestream is presented in English, but another livestream is available in Japanese.
A similar ispace mission in April 2023 failed when its uncrewed lander crashed while trying to land in the moon's Atlas Crater. It was ispace's first attempt to put a lander on the moon.
The mission is part of ispace's plan to colonize the moon by having people living on it by 2040, ABC News reported.
The privately owned aerospace firm intends to build a city housing 1,000 people and would host thousands more who could visit as tourists.
Officials at ispace also plan to land a much larger lander on the moon with assistance from NASA. That mission is scheduled to launch by 2027.
This story continues to develop. Check back for updates.
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