Japan’s iSpace has lost contact with its Hakuto-R lunar probe shortly after the scheduled landing time and has admitted that the mission has failed. The probe, launched in December 2021 by a SpaceX rocket, had been in lunar orbit for a month and was carrying material from several countries, including a space exploration vehicle from the United Arab Emirates. Although ground crews attempted to re-establish contact, after several minutes of waiting, they had to accept that they had lost the trail. The iSpace company has stated that it will continue to try to re-establish contact with the spacecraft.
So far, only the United States, Russia, and China have succeeded in putting robots on the moon in government-sponsored programs. The iSpace mission was not guaranteed to succeed, and other attempts by private companies, such as the Israeli SpaceIL module and the Indian Vikram probe, have also failed in the past. The Hakuto-R probe carried several rovers, including an eight-centimeter Japanese miniature model and the Emirates’ Rashid model, which would have been the Arab world’s first lunar rover.
The iSpace company aims to “extend the sphere of human life into space and create a sustainable world by providing high-frequency, low-cost transportation services to the Moon.” The company’s founder, Takeshi Hakamada, says the mission lays “the foundation for unlocking the Moon’s potential and transforming it into a robust and vibrant economic system” and believes the Earth’s satellite could host a population of 1,000 people by 2040, plus 10,000 annual visitors.
Although the iSpace mission has failed, other private companies such as Astrobotic and Intuitive Machines plan to send lunar landing missions this year in cooperation with NASA, which is seeking to develop the lunar economy and has commissioned private companies to carry out scientific experiments and materials. The US Artemis program aims to send manned flights to the Moon in the coming years to establish a base and deploy a space station in lunar orbit. Japan and the United States have also announced their intention to send a Japanese astronaut to the Moon before the end of this decade.