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The lunar mission that was to have returned the US to the Moon for the first time in 50 years appeared to be in jeopardy after a failure in the propulsion system resulted in a “critical loss” of fuel.
Astrobotic Technology, which had hoped to be the first private company to touch down on the surface of the Earth’s satellite with its Peregrine lander, said on Monday that it was “assessing what alternative mission profiles might be feasible”.
Astrobotic’s Peregrine mission was launched earlier on Monday from Florida’s Cape Canaveral spaceport aboard the Vulcan Centaur developed by United Launch Alliance, a rocket that was also making its maiden flight into space.
Just hours after what appeared to be a flawless launch and separation from the rocket, Peregrine experienced a “propulsion anomaly” that stopped it from pointing its solar panels stably at the Sun, Astrobotic said.
Engineers reoriented the panels and started to restore power butsoon after the lander began losing fuel. “The team is trying to stabilise the loss but given the situation we have prioritised maximising the science and data we can capture,” the group said in a statement.
In a post on X astronaut Chris Hadfield said: “Not looking good for Peregrine to land on the Moon — propulsion system failures are a misery. Up to the Astrobotic team to wring every last bit of learning out of this mission.”
The news will be a blow not just to Astrobotic but to Nasa which had paid $108mn to fly five scientific payloads to the Moon. The lander was also carrying payloads from six countries which had hoped to make their first lunar landings, including the UK, Mexico and Hungary.
Astrobotic’s Peregrine One is the first of several private missions supported by Nasa as part of its commercial lunar payload services initiative. The CLPS programme is a vital step in the US space agency’s Artemis programme, which aims to return humans to the Moon for the first time since the Apollo programme ended in 1972.
Nasa is counting on the development of commercial services to the lunar surface to help cut the costs of its own programmes.
If Peregrine fails to reach the Moon, the next candidate in the CLPS schedule is US start-up Intuitive Machines, which is due to fly its lander with Elon Musk’s SpaceX next month.
While Astrobotic may have failed, the launch of the 61-metre Vulcan Centaur rocket is a milestone for Colorado-based ULA, which is reported to have been put up for sale by its joint owners. The rocket, which weighed 663 tonnes when fully fuelled, has been more than a decade in development.
However, its launch has suffered delays because of issues with the BE-4 engines provided by Blue Origin, owned by Amazon’s Jeff Bezos, and an explosion during testing last March.
This flight is the first of two that will certify Vulcan for military payloads, with the second expected in April. Vulcan has four more flights booked during this year, with a schedule of more than 70 planned. It is hoping to fly twice a month by the end of next year.
Vulcan is also seeking to grab a share of the rapidly growing commercial launch sector but comes to market as SpaceX chief executive Musk prepares for a third attempt to launch his giant Starship into orbit.
SpaceX has revolutionised launch costs with its reusable Falcon rocket, and Starship’s capacity of 100-150 tonnes is widely expected to drive these down further.
However, Vulcan has not yet developed reusable technology and is likely to be more expensive. ULA is working on just such a development for Vulcan but it is several years away from deployment, the company’s executives said in a pre-launch briefing on Friday.
Vulcan was carrying a second payload from space memorial group Celestis, which is being flown by the rocket’s upper stage, Centaur. This will begin to travel towards the Sun in about four days’ time.
The Enterprise mission is sending the cremated remains and DNA of Star Trek creator and screenwriter Gene Roddenberry and that of some cast members including Nichelle Nichols, who played communications officer Lt Uhura in the TV and film series, into deep space, eventually to circle the Sun at a safe orbit.