NASA and Intuitive Machines’ second attempt to land a spacecraft on the Moon appears to have gone awry—again.
The IM-2, also known as Athena, was scheduled to land on the lunar surface today. The lander did successfully touch down on the Moon, but not in the right orientation. “We don’t believe we’re in the correct attitude on the surface of the Moon yet again,” Intuitive Machines CEO Steve Altemus said in a press conference.
“I don’t have all the data yet to say exactly what the attitude of the vehicle is. We’re collecting photos now and downlinking those and we’re going to get a picture from the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter camera from above, and we’ll confirm that in the coming days,” he added.
(Credit: NASA/Intuitive Machines)
The problems became evident during the live stream of Athena landing on the surface. The final photos from the spacecraft showed it awkwardly approaching the Moon from the vehicle’s side, rather than from the bottom. The live stream then cut off as Intuitive Machine was unable to confirm its full status.
As a result, there’s growing fear that Athena faces the same fate as its predecessor, IM-1 or Odysseus. It too tried to safely land on the Moon a year ago, but ended up tipping over during the process. This prevented the lander from collecting new energy from the Sun, forcing Intuitive Machines and NASA to abandon the craft as it went offline.
ExtremeTech reports that Intuitive Machines tried to rectify the mistakes with IM-2 by improving the craft’s laser instrument to ensure a safe touchdown. But it looks like Athena may have accidentally repeated history again with another botched landing.
Still, Intuitive Machines’ CEO reports that Athena is “charging on the surface.” The company has also been able to establish uplink and downlink functions with the craft. “So we are communicating,” he said. “We can command payloads on and off.”
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“We have powered down and done some power conservation steps as prudent measures to see how long and what objectives we can accomplish with the mission going forward,” he added.
Athena is designed to identify and drill for water sources on the Moon. The vehicle also carries a drone, named Grace, that can travel up to 2 kilometers from the lander and explore craters while capturing imagery.
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About Michael Kan
Senior Reporter
