ODYSSEUS
SPACECRAFT - SCI & TECH
News:
U.S. Moon Landing: How to Watch and What
to Know
What's
in the news?
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The Odysseus lunar lander has made the
first United States landing on the
moon in more than 50 years.
Odysseus
Spacecraft:
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Odysseus,
a spacecraft built by Intuitive
Machines, used a Falcon 9 rocket of SpaceX to take off from Earth on
February 15.
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Intuitive Machines is a ten-year-old
company based in Houston, USA.
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The spacecraft carried six NASA payloads to the Moon.
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The lander module of Odysseus, called
Nova-C, has become the second one, after Chandrayaan-3 last year, to land in
the Moon’s south pole region.
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This is the third moon-landing event
within a year, after Chandrayaan-3 and Japans’ SLIM (Smart Lander for
Investigating Moon).
Mission
Objectives:
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The lunar lander is designed to evaluate the environment at the moon’s
south pole.
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This is significant as NASA prepares to
send a crewed mission in September 2026 with Artemis III.
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Prior to deploying astronauts to this
area, however, the agency wants to gather additional data.
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This information will help evaluate
factors such as the quantity of water present and the accessibility of this
vital resource.
Funding:
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For this mission, NASA paid Intuitive
Machines $118m under a programme known as Commercial
Lunar Payload Services (CLPS).
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Under CLPS, so far, at least 14 private
companies have been contracted to carry NASA payloads to the Moon.
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This collaboration is aimed at creating
the market and technology ecosystem in the private space industry with respect
to science and technology needs of lunar exploration.