Japan’s moon lander has produced another surprise by waking up after the two-week lunar night, the nation’s space agency said yesterday.
The uncrewed Smart Lander for Investigating the Moon (SLIM) touched down last month at a wonky angle that left its solar panels facing the wrong way.
As the sun’s angle shifted, it came back to life for two days and carried out scientific observations of a crater with a high-specification camera, the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) said.
Photo: AFP / JAXA / Takara Tomy / Sony Group Corp / Doshisha University
It went to sleep again as darkness returned and, since it was “not designed for the harsh lunar nights,” JAXA had been uncertain whether it would reawaken.
“Yesterday we sent a command, to which SLIM responded,” JAXA said on social media yesterday. “SLIM succeeded in surviving a night on the Moon’s surface while maintaining its communication function!”
It said that communications were “terminated after a short time, as it was still lunar midday and the temperature of the communication equipment was very high.”
“Preparations are being made to resume operations when instrument temperatures have sufficiently cooled,” JAXA said.
SLIM, dubbed the “moon sniper” for its precision landing technology, touched down within its target landing zone on Jan. 20.
The feat was a win for Japan’s space program after a string of failures, making the nation only the fifth to achieve a “soft landing” on the moon after the US, the Soviet Union, China and India, but during its descent the craft suffered engine problems and ended up on its side, meaning the solar panels were facing west instead of up.
The latest news came after JAXA toasted a successful blast-off for its new flagship H3 rocket on Feb. 17, making it third time lucky after years of delays and two previous failed attempts.
Nations including Russia, South Korea and the United Arab Emirates are also trying their luck to reach the moon.
The first US spaceship to the moon since the Apollo era — the uncrewed Odysseus lander built by a private company and funded by NASA — landed near the lunar south pole on Thursday last week, but its maker said the US spacecraft is probably lying sideways following its dramatic landing, even as ground controllers work to download data and surface photographs from it.
Private Japanese firm ispace also attempted to land on the moon last year, but the probe suffered a “hard landing” and contact was lost.
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