Japans Lunar Ambitions Shattered: Resilience Lander Crashes, ispace Promises to Learn from Setback

Officials have reported that a Japanese spacecraft attempting to record the nation’s inaugural private moon landing ended up crashing on the lunar surface. The Resilience lander, which was developed by the Tokyo-based company ispace, lost contact just one minute and 45 seconds prior to its intended soft landing on June 5 at 3:17 p.m. EDT. The landing was specifically aimed at the Mare Frigoris area on the Moon’s near side. This incident marks a second setback for ispace on the moon, following a malfunction of its laser rangefinder, a notable improvement over the earlier failure experienced in April 2023.

Japan’s Resilience Lunar Lander Experiences Hard Landing; ispace Commits to Analyze and Rebuild

An official announcement from ispace indicated that the telemetry from Resilience showed that data delays from the rangefinder resulted in an inability to adjust the landing velocity. This is presumed to have caused a “hard landing,” meaning the spacecraft struck the moon’s surface at a speed too high to endure or fulfill its mission. The lander, which was equipped with five payloads including a Tenacious rover and scientific instruments, was lost in the crash. Takeshi Hakamada, the company’s CEO, expressed regret and stated that they would use the experience to inform future missions.

The Hakuto-R Mission 2 team deployed the Resilience lander, measuring 7.5 feet tall and weighing 2,200 pounds, into space using a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket in early May. However, despite achieving a correct orbit, the lander impacted the lunar surface at 192 meters, reminiscent of Mission 1’s failure in 2023, which resulted from an unaddressed issue with one of its altitude sensors.

The failure of Resilience adds to the list of private efforts to explore the moon, following unsuccessful missions such as Beresheet and Peregrine. Crewed missions like Odysseus and Blue Ghost demonstrate that the aspirations for commercial space exploration are indeed feasible. The second Hakuto-R mission, being a private initiative, represents a setback for Japan’s space exploration goals. Nevertheless, ispace remains committed to developing Mission 3 and Mission 4 using its larger Apex 1.0 lander, despite this setback.

Hakamada emphasized that the team’s current focus is to determine the causes behind the crash. “Supporters are feeling let down,” stated CFO Nozaki, “but ispace still has uncharted territory on the moon, and our journey does not conclude here, even though Mission 2 did not unfold as expected.”