HAKUTO-R Mission 1
HAKUTO-R Mission 1 — the first lunar lander of the Japanese company ispace, launched on 11 December 2022 with the UAE's Rashid rover and a small JAXA robot aboard. It reached lunar orbit on 21 March 2023 and began its descent into Atlas crater on 25 April (UTC). Crossing the crater's 3 km-high rim confused its altitude estimate: the software rejected its altimeter's readings, believed it had reached the ground while it was still about 5 km up, and hovered until its fuel ran out, then fell. NASA's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter photographed its debris the next day.
Key facts
Mission & specifications
Mission
- Operator
- ispace
- Launched
- December 11, 2022
- Status
- Lost
Trajectory
- Distance from the Sun
- 1 AU
- Computed from the cached position
- Distance from Earth
- 0.303 AU
- Computed from cached positions
- Distance from Venus
- 0.342 AU
- Computed from cached positions
Mission
HAKUTO-R Mission 1 was the first lunar lander of the Tokyo company ispace. It was launched on 11 December 2022 at 07:38 UTC on a Falcon 9 from Cape Canaveral, with NASA's Lunar Flashlight, and carried the United Arab Emirates' Rashid rover and JAXA's small transformable robot. It took a slow, low-energy route that reached about 1.376 million km from Earth, then entered lunar orbit on 21 March 2023. It began its descent toward Atlas crater at 15:40 UTC on 25 April. ispace's investigation found that as it passed over the crater's rim, a cliff about 3 km high, the software judged its altimeter to be faulty and rejected its readings. From then on the lander estimated its own altitude as zero while it was really about 5 km up. It kept descending slowly, waiting to touch down, until its fuel ran out, and then fell. The landing site had been changed after the design was reviewed, and that change was not fully simulated. NASA's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter photographed the site on 26 April and found at least four large pieces of debris at 47.581°N, 44.094°E. ispace's second lander, Resilience, crashed in Mare Frigoris in 2025.
- 2022HAKUTO-R Mission 1 launches toward the Moon on a Falcon 9 rocketLaunch
With NASA's Lunar Flashlight.
- 2023Into lunar orbitArrival
At first about 100 × 6,000 km.
- 2023HAKUTO-R Mission 1 crashes in Atlas craterMission end
Its software believed it had landed while it was still about 5 km up.
Images
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