United States: The Odysseus probe of Intuitive Machines, a Houston-based space company, will cut its lunar mission short because engineers expect to lose contact with the lander. The craft landed near the lunar south pole, marking the first ever privately owned lander to touch the moon and the first from the United States since the final Apollo mission in 1972.
In spite of the fact that Odysseus was intended to last for five to ten days, it will end within five days of landing on the moon, and it is unknown how much scientific data will be lost as a result. Human error and forgoing tests contributed to the short lifespan of the probe, which was launched by Intuitive Machines with NASA.
Mike Hansen, the company’s navigation systems head, stated that, “There were certainly things we could’ve done to test it and actually fire it. They would’ve been very time-consuming and very costly.”
Odysseus had to take an extra orbit to give controllers time to make a perfect landing near the Moon’s south pole due to a laser-guided range finder in-flight malfunction. The laser safety switch, which can only be disabled manually, was not unlocked by company engineers before launch, which resulted in the malfunction being discovered hours before landing.
According to Hansen, the company is still investigating whether an ad-libbed navigation solution used by a NASA-supplied experimental system on the lander caused the spacecraft to land sideways. As stated by the company, Odysseus encountered uneven ground on the lunar surface and tipped over, apparently propped up on a boulder.
As a result, its solar panels received less sunlight and its antennae were pointed towards the surface of the moon, which caused some communications to be blocked. The company stated that, it spent approximately $100 million (£78 million) on the lander and that NASA provided $118 million (£93 million).
SCIENCE | Historical! Intuitive Machines’ Odysseus robot lands on moon
