The company that overturned on the Moon has sent a spacecraft again a year later. The same thing happened

“We do not believe to be in the correct orientation on the moon, once again,” summarized the CEO of Intuitive Machines, Steve Altemus, at the beginning of a press conference on the injury of the Athena spacecraft.

Nova-C has overturned again. The Nova-C Lunar Module “Athena” of the American company intuitive machines landed on the moon Thursday, March 6, at 5:30 p.m. UTC. The ship is alive, transmits telemetry and can receive commands. He even receives light in his solar panels, but is poorly oriented.

After a week of travel, 39 turns to the moon and a descent maneuver on the South Lunar Pole in which the Methane and Liquid Oxygen Propulsion System apparently worked perfectly, something went wrong when perched on the satellite. Intuitive Machines does not know exactly where the ship is and where it is looking, but it seems to have been sideways.

A year later. On February 22, 2024, Intuitive Machines was called to become the first private company to successfully alunizar. However, the Nova-C module “Odysseus” had a more abrupt landing than expected, left one of its legs and ended up turning on the moon.

Athena has suffered the same destination. Intuitive Machines will wait for the probe Lunar reconnaissance orbiter NASA fly over the area to see exactly where it has been and which of its four sides is face down. For now, it is suspected that it can be on a slope.

In energy saving mode. While finding what happened, Intuitive Machines has turned off several subsystems to preserve the useful life of the probe. In the South Lunar Pole, the temperatures are extreme and, depending on what position the ship and how much light will receive these days, it is possible that much of the energy is required to light heating.

Athena was launched to Mons Mouton, a plateau near the South Lunar Pole, to display the NASA Prime-1 experiment with the aim of looking for ice water in the subsoil. It is possible that part of the scientific mission will continue, but the results of the mission will be “off-nominal,” said Steve Altemus, who however considers to continue in touch with the ship.

Image | Nova-C “Odysseus” and Nova-C “Athena” (intuitive machines)

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