Japan's ispace to attempt second Moon landing after 2022 crash

Company could soon begin lunar "taxi services" for clients looking to send technology to the surface

A rendering of the Hakuto-R Mission 2 landing vehicle orbiting the Moon. Photo: ispace

A Japanese company that failed to land a spacecraft on the Moon in 2022 is attempting to touch down with its second lunar mission, Hakuto-R Venture Mission 2.

Ispace’s first mission, Hakuto-R Mission 1, crashed on the lunar surface.

It is now attempting to land its Resilience lander, which is currently orbiting the Moon and will gradually move closer to the surface for an expected landing on June 5.

“Compared to Mission 1, Mission 2 is progressing as smoothly as can be expected from the moment of launch, which is proof that the mission operation specialists have made meticulous preparations,” ispace founder Takeshi Hakamada said. “I feel that the experience and knowledge from the previous mission have been put to good use.”

The first mission failed because the vehicle’s software miscalculated its altitude, mistakenly believing it had already reached the lunar surface while it was still descending. It ran out of fuel moments before the expected touchdown and crashed into the surface.

The impact site on the Moon where UAE's Rashid rover crash landed. Gif: Nasa

This latest mission is carrying a small rover, Tenacious, designed by ispace Europe that will collect regolith, otherwise known as Moon dust. It is also carrying an experimental water electrolyser that will test to see if producing oxygen and hydrogen from resources already available on the surface is possible.

Dr Dimitra Atri, an astrophysicist at New York University Abu Dhabi, told The National the Moon could eventually become a refuelling station for Mars-bound missions.

“Harnessing the water on the Moon to produce oxygen and hydrogen, essential components of rocket fuel, holds the potential to transform lunar mining operations into a 'gas station' for future space missions,” he said. “The idea is that by converting water into these propellants, the Moon could serve as a launching point for spacecraft, offering a cost-effective alternative due to its lower gravity.”

If the landing of the Resilience vehicle is successful, ispace said that it would begin “full scale commercial operations” with its third mission, providing clients with direct lunar transportation services that would take only weeks to complete.

The cis-lunar economy, the economic activities taking place in the space between the Earth and the Moon's orbit such as satellite operations and lunar resource extraction, could exceed a value of $154 billion by 2040, according to a PwC lunar market assessment report in 2021.

Companies are tapping into this market with demand rising from government space agencies looking to outsource transportation services for spacecraft or rovers they’ve built, as well as for future crewed missions to the surface. The UAE, for example, has developed its second rover, Rashid 2.

“In the medium to long term [the next few decades], the development of a cis-lunar economy holds great promise for both space agencies and the private sector, which should work together to cut costs and benefit from each other’s expertise and capabilities,” Dr Nidhal Guessoum, an astrophysicist at the American University of Sharjah, told The National in an earlier interview.

“For economic purposes, activities on and around the Moon will focus on extracting water, Earth-rare minerals and construction materials.

“Private companies can provide services, ranging from transportation to, on and from the Moon, to construction, manufacturing, infrastructure, food production and recycling. And lastly, tourism and exploration will probably start slowly but then boom in a few decades.”

Only five countries have so far managed to land successfully on the Moon, including the US, the former Soviet Union, China, Japan and India. Two American companies, Intuitive Machines and Firefly, have also secured safe touchdowns.

Landing on the surface is no easy feat, as the Moon has no atmosphere so engineers cannot use parachutes to slow down the spacecraft. A propulsion system on the craft is used instead to change its velocity and attitude. The unstable terrain of the lunar surface can make a safe landing more difficult.