The launch of the landing baptized “Hakuto” was carried out after two postpones from the American base of Cap Canaveral.
Mo12345lemonde with AFP
A lunar landing built by a Japanese company, which could become the first private but also Japanese machine to land on the moon, took off on Sunday, December 11 from Cap Canaveral. The launch was carried out by a SpaceX rocket from the American database of Florida, after two postpones due to additional checks.
The lunar machine, manufactured by the start-up Ispace of Tokyo, left aboard the Falcon-9 space launcher at 2 h 38 local (7 h 38 GMT), according to images broadcast live. So far, only the United States, Russia and China have managed to land robots on the Moon, located about 400,000 kilometers from the earth.
ispace, which has around 200 employees, intends to set up “a frequent moon transport service at low cost”. The Hakuto project of this company was one of the five finalists in the international competition Google Lunar Xprize, who had ended without winner, no company having managed to make a robot alunnir before the date set (2018). But some projects have not been abandoned.
Another finalist, of the Israeli organization Spaceil, failed in April 2019 to become the first mission to private funding to succeed in the feat. The alumni had crashed on the surface while trying to land.
a mini-rover of the United Arab Emirates
The ISPACE company has designed its boat to use a minimum of fuel to save money and leave more space for freight. The machine therefore takes a slow and low energy path to the moon, flying 1.6 million kilometers from the earth before making a loop and crossing the moon by the end of April.
The Japanese alunteer has embarked the first lunar rover of the United Arab Emirates, a small mobile robot of ten kilos, equipped with French cameras, which must operate on the surface during the ten days of the mission.