The American lunar lander had a fuel leak and was on its way to Earth, where it is believed to have burned up in the atmosphere this Thursday. More than fifty years after the end of the Apollo program, sending a machine to land on the lunar surface remains an achievement.
It's a failure. The Peregrine One mission was intended to mark the American return to lunar soil, fifty years after the cancellation of the Apollo program. Except everything didn't go as planned. Shortly after launch, the Peregrine spacecraft suffered a mishap and it quickly became clear that it would not be able to land smoothly on the lunar surface as originally planned due to a fuel leak.
The American space company Astrobotic, which operates the mission, therefore redirected the spacecraft to return to Earth, where it probably disintegrated upon re-entry into the atmosphere on Thursday, January 18th.
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Even today, reaching the moon is still a feat. Because if it is once again a source of desire, then this has not been the case for almost four decades. The lunar landing of China's Chang'e 3 mission in 2013 was the first attempt since 1976 and the Soviet Luna 24 mission. On the Moon, gravity is six times stronger than on Earth, but there is no atmosphere. Unlike Mars, where spaceships use parachutes to fly to their destination and decelerate, moon landings rely solely on engines. A dangerous undertaking and we must therefore expect new failures.
Numerous startups are in the starting blocks
Plus, Astrobotic isn't the first to break its teeth. In 2019, Israeli startup SpaceIL's Beresheet probe experienced an “engine failure” during its descent. Japanese company ispace's lunar lander Hakuto-R crashed in 2023 after a “loss of communication” that occurred minutes before impacting Earth. This remains an achievement even for space agencies. The recent failure of Russia's Lune-25 mission is evidence of this. The Indians, for their part, had to try twice before succeeding. Last August, the Indian Space Research Organization (Isro) successfully landed the Vikram lander during the Chandrayaan-3 mission, four years after the crash.
So far, only four nations have managed to land on the moon: the USA, the Soviet Union, China and India. But maybe not for long. This Friday, January 19th, the Japanese Aerospace Research Agency (Jaxa) will attempt to land on the moon for the first time with its SLIM lander. If successful, Japan would join this very exclusive club. In the United States, several startups are also on the launch pad, hoping to be the first private organization to reach the moon, with lucrative contracts with NASA under the new public partnership program. -private CLPS (for “Commercial Lunar Payload Services”).
The US space agency is trying to cut costs as much as possible by outsourcing the delivery of equipment to the moon to private companies like startup Astrobotic. The American space company Intuitive Machines plans to launch three missions to the moon, the first of which is scheduled to launch next February. Texas startup Firefly Aerospace will launch its Blue Ghost lunar lander next spring. The startup Astrobotic will try its luck again next November, but with a different ship, Griffin. At the end of the year it will be the second attempt by the Japanese company ispace with its Hakuto-R spacecraft.
Matthieu DELACHARLERY