A Week of Moon Landing Triumphs and Setbacks
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In the latest episode of This Week in Space podcast, hosts Rod Pyle and Tariq Malik dive into what might be described as "Moon Landing Week" – a period that saw both spectacular successes and disappointing setbacks in humanity's renewed push to explore our lunar neighbor.
Firefly's Flawless Landing
The week started with a resounding success for commercial space company Firefly Aerospace. Their Blue Ghost lander executed what Tariq Malik described as a "textbook touchdown" on the lunar plains of Mare Chryseum.
"If you want to talk about a flawless landing... it was absolutely spectacular," Malik enthused during the podcast. The mission, part of NASA's Commercial Lunar Payload Services (CLPS) program, carried ten different NASA experiments to the lunar surface.
The Blue Ghost lander not only touched down smoothly but quickly began returning images, including what Malik called a "haunting picture of its silhouette or shadow on the surface with the Earth up above." The mission is designed to last 14 days (one lunar day) and has already begun testing various experiments, including a vacuum device designed to collect lunar regolith.
As Rod and Tariq discussed, the lander's design may have contributed to its success. With its squat, low center of gravity and wide stance, the Blue Ghost's design seems to have taken lessons from NASA's 1960s Surveyor missions, which demonstrated that wide legs and a low profile work well for lunar landing vehicles.
Intuitive Machines' Challenging South Pole Attempt
Just one day before the podcast recording, space watchers witnessed a very different outcome when Intuitive Machines attempted to land their Athena spacecraft near the south pole of the Moon.
This mission was particularly ambitious, as Tariq explained: "This was actually a really audacious mission." The Athena lander carried NASA's ice-drilling PRIME-1 drill, two small rovers, a hopping spacecraft called GRACE, a Nokia Labs cell tower experiment, and numerous other payloads.
Unlike Firefly's landing site in the smoother mare regions, Intuitive Machines targeted the Moon's challenging south pole, where the terrain is much more rugged and the lighting conditions are especially harsh due to the low sun angle.
"They had new cameras, new navigation systems, all sorts of stuff on it," Malik noted. Despite these improvements over their previous IM-1 Odysseus lander (which had tipped over during its landing earlier in 2024), the Athena mission encountered serious difficulties.
According to the information shared during the podcast, Intuitive Machines believes their navigation radar experienced significant noise issues during descent. While the approach initially seemed promising, the spacecraft hit the ground and tipped over, ending up with its legs pointing upward "almost like a cartoon character," as Malik colorfully described it.
The mission's location in a crater at the south pole proved especially problematic for power generation. Without adequate sunlight to charge its batteries, the spacecraft quickly lost power. "They're not getting the charging that they need to keep the spacecraft alive," Tariq explained, noting that the mission appeared to be over much sooner than planned.
Engineering Challenges and Looking Forward
During their discussion, Rod pointed out that he'd been consulting with various engineers and scientists about these lunar landers, including their mutual friend Pascal. A key concern has been the center of gravity on these vehicles.
Interestingly, Tariq noted that despite appearances, Intuitive Machines' chief technology officer Tim Crane had stated during a post-landing press conference that "the center of gravity is lower than it looks" on their vehicle. Nevertheless, the rugged nature of the south polar region presented challenges that proved too difficult to overcome in this case.
Despite the setback, Intuitive Machines isn't giving up. The company already has plans for IM-3 next year and IM-4 in 2027 under a $117 million contract with NASA. As Tariq noted, "They're going to learn from this... and they're going to stick it, hopefully, on the next attempt."
The Contrasts in Lander Design
Rod highlighted an interesting observation about the two landers: "If you look at the Blue Ghost lander, it's very squat, it has a very wide stance... we learned in the 60s with Surveyor, with that series of landings on the moon, that you wanted really wide legs and a very low machine."
This design philosophy clearly paid dividends for Firefly, while Intuitive Machines' taller, more top-heavy design (which Rod likened to R2-D2) faced greater challenges, particularly in the unforgiving terrain of the lunar south pole.
This week of lunar landing drama was just one segment of a packed episode that also featured discussions about SpaceX Starship's latest test flight, updates on the aging Voyager spacecraft, the return of the X-37B space plane, and a fascinating interview with former NASA Chief Scientist Dr. Jim Green.
To hear the complete conversation, including Dr. Green's insights on Mars sample return missions, the search for extraterrestrial civilizations, and his remarkable career journey from a high school astronomer to NASA's top scientist, check out the full podcast episode of This Week in Space on your favorite podcast platform.
