On Wednesday, a Japanese spacecraft lost contact with the company moments before it was supposed to land on the moon.
The founder and CEO of the company, ispace, Takeshi Hakamada, announced that the mission had apparently failed, as communications ceased while the lander descended the final 33 feet at a speed of around 16 mph.
The flight controllers in Tokyo were expressionless as they waited for any word from the lander, which they presume to have crashed.
Hakamada stated, “We have to assume that we could not complete the landing on the lunar surface.”
BREAKING: Japan's ispace says Moon landing may have failed, no contact with spacecraft pic.twitter.com/afscUiPSJ9
— BNO News Live (@BNODesk) April 25, 2023
The Japanese company, ispace, would have been the first private business to achieve a lunar landing if the mission had been successful.
So far, only three governments have successfully landed on the moon: Russia, the United States, and China. Israel attempted a lunar landing in 2019, but their spacecraft was destroyed on impact.
The Japanese lander was 7 feet long and carried a mini lunar rover for the United Arab Emirates, a toy-like robot from Japan designed to roll around in the moon dust, and items from private customers on board.
