The Nova-C Lunar Lander, also known as Odyssey, did not wake up from sleep mode after the moonlit night and so its operations were permanently halted. The American company that developed the device, Intuitive Machines, reported on social network X that the device was not designed to withstand extremely low temperatures. Nova-C was put into sleep mode with the onset of a moonlit night on March 1.

“As of 10:30 a.m. Central American Time on March 23, flight control experts concluded that their predictions were correct; Odyssey’s power system would no longer be able to send signals to Earth. “This confirms that Odyssey is retired for good and makes its mark in history as the first commercial lunar lander to land on the moon.” – said the company.

Intuitive Machines has previously said that before the spacecraft’s batteries died, they exceeded developers’ expectations by placing it in a configuration that would allow it to continue operating if Odyssey’s systems remained operational after testing harsh lunar conditions.

On February 23, Nova-C touched down on the Moon’s surface in the area of ​​the Malapert A crater, 300 km from the satellite’s south pole. The aircraft landed in emergency mode due to the failure of a number of onboard systems. As a result, one of the supports broke and the module tilted sideways at an angle of 30° due to which one of the solar panels was not facing the Sun and could not fully charge the battery.

Despite miscalculations, “Odyssey” operated for more than six days and collected a large array of data sent to Earth, the total volume of which was about 350 Mbytes.