Moon mission in space: SpaceX rocket launched – German technology on board

A year ago, Intutive Machines succeeded in completing the first commercial moon landing in space history. Now the US company wants to repeat the success.

About a year after the first commercial landing of a private mission on the moon, the US space company Intuitive Machines has sent a second lander to the Earth's satellite.

The lander "Athena" was launched on Wednesday evening (US local time) on board a "Falcon 9" rocket from the space company SpaceX owned by tech billionaire Elon Musk from the Cape Canaveral spaceport in the US state of Florida , as live images from the US space agency NASA showed.

"Athena" is expected to be on the move for around a week and will land on the Mons Mouton mountain in the southern polar region of the moon on March 6 at the earliest. The mission is then scheduled to last around ten days. The unmanned lander is 4.3 meters high and has a diameter of 1.6 meters. It is intended to help find raw materials and water on the Earth's satellite.

For this purpose, "Athena" has, among other things, a drill that can penetrate up to one meter beneath the lunar surface and a mass spectrometer that can detect volatile substances. In addition, "Grace" is a small device that virtually hops over the moon in short flights. It is intended to take detailed surface images and explore craters. "Athena" also has two rovers in its luggage that are intended to roll over the moon: "Mapp" and the very small, two-wheeled "Yaoki".

Numerous companies and organizations are involved in the mission called "IM-2," including the German Aerospace Center (DLR). The mission is part of NASA's "CLPS" (Commercial Lunar Payload Services) initiative. With this program, the US space agency wants to collect a lot of knowledge on its own way back to the moon in a comparatively inexpensive and efficient way by working with private companies.

Last year, the company Intuitive Machines, based in Houston, Texas, achieved the first commercial moon landing in space history with its lander "Odysseus". "Odysseus" was the first US device to land on the moon in more than 50 years. However, the unmanned lander tipped over and tilted when it touched down. However, data could still be collected.

Moon landings are considered to be technically extremely demanding - and often go wrong. Nevertheless, there are currently many attempts around the world. Just a few weeks ago, two more landers were launched from the USA to the Earth's satellite: the "Blue Ghost" lander from the US company Firefly Aerospace is due to arrive on Sunday, the "Resilience" lander from the Japanese start-up ispace in a few months.