Private Japanese lunar lander enters orbit around moon ahead of a June touchdown

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Private Japanese lunar lander enters orbit around moon ahead of a June touchdown

A

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from Japan is now circling

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, with just another month to go before it attempts a touchdown.

Tokyo-based

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said Wednesday morning its Resilience lander entered lunar orbit.

“The countdown to lunar landing has now officially begun,” the company said in a statement.

SpaceX launched Resilience with U.S-based Firefly Aerospace’s

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in January. Firefly got there first in March, becoming the first private outfit to successfully land a spacecraft on the moon without crashing or falling over. Another American company, Intuitive Machines, landed a spacecraft on the moon a few days later, but it ended up sideways in a crater.

Now it’s ispace’s turn. It’s targeting the first week of June for Resilience’s touchdown. The company’s first lander crashed into the moon in 2023.

The lander holds a mini rover equipped with a scoop to gather lunar dirt for analysis as well as other experiments.

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#Private #Japanese #lunar #lander #enters #orbit #moon #ahead #June #touchdown

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