NASA captures where the first private lunar lander impacted

May 23. (EUROPE PRESS) –

NASA’s Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) spacecraft has taken images of the crash site of the ill-fated first private lunar lander, Japan’s HAKUTO-R mission, it seems destroyed.

This lunar lander from the ispace firm was launched on December 11, 2022, a privately funded spacecraft who planned to land on the lunar surface.

After a journey of several months to the Moon, the spacecraft began a controlled descent to the surface to land near the Atlas crater. The ispace team announced on April 26 that an anomaly occurred and that the HAKUTO-R Mission 1 lunar lander had not landed safely on the surface.

On April 26, NASA’s Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) spacecraft acquired 10 images around the landing site with its narrow-angle cameras. pictures covered a region of approximately 40 km by 45 km. Using an image acquired before the landing attempt, the LRO camera science team began searching for the lander, reports NASA.

FOUR PIECES OF RUBBLE

From the pair of temporary images, the LRO camera team identified an unusual surface change near the nominal landing site. The picture shows at least four prominent pieces of rubble and several small changes (47.581 degrees north latitude, 44.094 degrees east longitude).

The central feature in the image above shows several bright pixels in the upper left corner and several dark pixels in the lower right corner. This is the opposite of the nearby rocks, suggesting it could be a small crater or different parts of the lander’s body. This site will be further analyzed in the coming months as LRO has the opportunity to make additional observations of the site under various lighting conditions and viewing angles.