Japan has sent two ambitious missions into the sky: a pioneering lunar lander and a powerful X-ray space telescope. Japan’s H-2A rocket carrying the SLIM lander and XRISM space telescope took off from the Tanegashima Space Center today (September 6) at 19:42 EST (23:42 GMT; September 7, 8:42 Japan Time). This was about 10 days later than originally scheduled due to weather delays.

Both spacecraft were deployed as scheduled, back-to-back less than an hour after takeoff. If all goes as planned, in a few months SLIM (Intelligent Landing Vehicle for Lunar Exploration) will attempt to make Japan’s first soft landing on the moon; this precision landing will pave the way for even more ambitious achievements. path.

Representatives of the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) wrote in the job description:

“The project will aim to reduce the weight of more functional equipment for observing and landing on resource-scarce planets while considering future solar system exploration probes,” they added.

shooting for the moon

SLIM is a small spacecraft that is only 7.9 feet (2.4 meters) high, 8.8 feet (2.7 meters) long and 5.6 feet (1.7 meters) wide. The balance weighed about 700 kilograms at launch, but about 70% of that weight was fuel.

SLIM will take a long, cyclical and economical route to the Moon, eventually reaching lunar orbit in three to four months. It will then observe the lunar surface for a month or so before attempting to land in Shioli Crater, a 300m wide impact field located at 13 degrees south latitude on the moon’s near side.

The probe aims to land within 330 feet (100 m) of its target point in Shioli Crater; This is a more precise landing than any previous lunar lander has attempted. The aim is to demonstrate the technology of point landing that could open the Moon and other celestial bodies to more extensive research.

JAXA officials wrote in their mission statement: “By creating a SLIM lander, people will make a qualitative shift towards being able to land where we want, not just where it’s easy to land, as before.” “Achieving this will make it possible to land on planets with scarcer resources than the Moon.”

SLIM also has two mini-probes that will be launched to the lunar surface after landing. According to JAXA’s mission press kit, the two smaller vehicles will help the mission crew monitor the status of the larger lander, take pictures of the landing site, and provide “an independent communications system for direct communication with Earth.”

The SLIM is not the first lunar lander to be built by JAXA. The agency’s tiny OMOTENASHI spacecraft was one of 10 cube satellites launched by NASA’s Artemis 1 mission to the moon in November 2022. Artemis 1 succeeded, while OMOTENASHI failed; managers were unable to contact the small probe in time for the planned landing attempt. (A few other Artemis 1 cube moons also failed their mission.)

Previously, the Japanese landing module had attempted to land on the moon. Tokyo-based ispace’s Hakuto-R lander has reached lunar orbit – a huge feat for a private spacecraft – but crashed during a landing attempt last April.

The success of SLIM will therefore be historic. To date, only four countries have made a soft probe landing on the Moon: the Soviet Union, the United States, China, and India. India only added its name to this particular list last month, when the Chandrayaan-3 mission landed near the Moon’s south pole. Source