Japan's ispace lander transmits first image of crescent Earth on its way to the Moon

Japan’s private firm ispace is currently monitoring its lunar lander HAKUTO-R which launched to the Moon on December 11. The lander is carrying a mini rover developed by the UAE and lifted off atop SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket from the Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida.

About two days after the launch, ispace confirmed that all systems of the lander are working well and that it has attained a stable altitude on its way to the Moon.

On December 13, the lander even sent its first image of Earth which it captured 19 hours after its deployment from Falcon 9’s second stage. According to ispace, the power supply to the lander is stable and there are no deficiencies in its core systems. The mission teams have also achieved initial critical operational conditions.  

Japan nears realisation of Moon landing dream

The HAKUTO lander, which translates to white rabbit, is part of the Mission 1 (M1) whose success would help Japan to enter the list of countries to land a spacecraft on the Moon. ispace has planned a touchdown at the Atlas crater, which is 87 kilometres across and just over 2 kilometres deep, in the northeastern section of the moon’s near side. But before that, HAKUTO will take a fuel-efficient path to the Moon which would take it 1.6 million km from Earth before it heads toward the lunar surface. 

The company says that there are 10 big milestones to be achieved between launch and landing, each of which will take it closer to validating the equipped technologies for future missions. "Recognising the possibility of an anomaly during the mission, the results will be weighed and evaluated against the criteria and incorporated into future missions already in development between now and 2025," ispace said in a statement. "Mission 2 and Mission 3, which also will contribute to NASA’s Artemis Program, will further improve the maturity of ispace’s technology and business model."

Once the touchdown is successful, HAKUTO will roll out the Rashid rover developed by UAE Mohammed Bin Rashid Space Centre (MBRSC) which will begin its 14-lunar-day long (one Earth day) exploration mission. The 10-kg rover's task is to study the Moon's electrically charged environment and perform other technology demonstrations. Notably, UAE's endeavour is the first rover mission to the Moon from the Arab world. It is also the first country from the Middle East to send an orbiter named Al Amal (Hope) to Mars in July 2020 and it arrived in the Martian orbit in February 2021.