A Japanese company, ispace, has blamed a laser navigation tool for its second lunar crash landing, which occurred earlier this month. The lander, named Resilience, was attempting to touch down on the moon’s far north side when it lost contact and crashed. According to officials, the problem lay with the lander’s laser range finder, which failed to accurately measure the spacecraft’s distance from the lunar surface.
This is the second failure for ispace in two years, with its first attempt crashing into the moon in 2023 due to bad software. Despite this setback, the company plans to continue pursuing its lunar landing ambitions, with a third mission planned for 2027 and a fourth scheduled for later. To improve its chances of success, ispace will conduct extra tests and increase its development costs by up to $10 million.
CEO Takeshi Hakamada has assured that his company remains committed to regaining customers’ trust and pushing forward with its future missions. Experts outside the company will also join the review process, and ispace will collaborate more closely with the Japanese Space Agency on technical matters.
Source: https://apnews.com/article/ispace-japan-moon-landing-crash-3598065a23f036d684ad8cd989791ad4