Chimera-1
Chimera-1 — a space tug built by Epic Aerospace to carry a small satellite to geostationary orbit, launched on 27 February 2025 (UTC) on the Falcon 9 that carried Intuitive Machines' IM-2 lander toward the Moon. Its route used a swing past the Moon, but it could send telemetry and could not receive commands, so it could not change course. It passed the Moon on 3 March 2025 and went on into an orbit around the Sun, its satellite still aboard. It was not a Moon mission; it is here because it flew past the Moon. (Its position here is representative.)
Key facts
Mission & specifications
Mission
- Operator
- Epic Aerospace
- Launched
- February 27, 2025
- Status
- Completed
Trajectory
- Distance from the Sun
- 0.996 AU
- Computed from the cached position
- Distance from Earth
- 3,132,747 km
- Computed from cached positions
- Distance from Venus
- 0.28 AU
- Computed from cached positions
Mission
Chimera-1 was a space tug, a small spacecraft built to carry other satellites from the orbit a rocket leaves them in to the orbit they need. Its builder, Epic Aerospace, launched it on 27 February 2025 at 00:16 UTC as one of the passengers on the Falcon 9 that sent Intuitive Machines' IM-2 lander toward the Moon, carrying a small satellite for a customer who has not been named. Its plan was to use a swing past the Moon to reach geostationary orbit, 36,000 km above the equator. After launch it sent telemetry but could not receive commands, so it could not steer. It passed the Moon on 3 March 2025 without changing course and went on into an orbit around the Sun, with its passenger still aboard. Amateur radio astronomers tracked its faint signal in the weeks that followed. No distance for its lunar flyby has been published.
- 2025Chimera-1 launches on a Falcon 9 rocketLaunch
Sharing the ride with Intuitive Machines' IM-2 lander.
Unable to receive commands, it heads on into an orbit around the Sun.
Images
No openly licensed image of Chimera-1 has been found.