Japan’s high-precision “Moon Sniper” lander has touched down on lunar surface in a first for the country, the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) has said.
The Smart Lander for Investigating Moon (SLIM) probe began its “power descent sequence” towards the lunar surface early Saturday local time (15:00 GMT Friday).
The space agency said its unmanned spacecraft is currently on the moon, but is still “checking its status”. More details will be given at a news conference that is expected shortly.
By accomplishing this feat, Japan became the world’s fifth country to put a spacecraft on the moon, using a technology it calls unprecedented and crucial for advancing lunar exploration, particularly in the quest for lunar water and the potential for human habitation.
Speaking ahead of the touch-down, Shinichiro Sakai, JAXA’s SLIM project manager, said “proving Japan has this technology would bring us a huge advantage in upcoming international missions like Artemis,” referring to US space agency NASA’s crewed moon mission.
“No other nation has achieved this.”
Japan has been actively looking to expand its role in space activities, forging partnerships with the United States, to address the growing military and technological influence of China, extending even into the realm of space.
Only four other nations have successfully landed on the moon – India, China, the US and Russia.
Japan is actively participating in NASA’s Artemis programme with the goal of sending one of its astronauts to the moon.
However, JAXA has faced multiple setbacks, including a launch failure in March of the new flagship rocket H3 that was meant to match cost-competitiveness against commercial rocket providers like SpaceX.
In August, India’s Chandrayaan-3 made an historic touchdown on the moon’s south pole, a major technological feat given the rough terrain, highlighting the country’s rise as a major player in space.
JAXA has emphasised that its high-precision technology will become a powerful tool in future exploration of hilly moon poles, seen as a potential source of oxygen, fuel and water. Japan also plans a joint unmanned lunar polar exploration with India in 2025.
The Japanese agency has twice landed on small asteroids, but a moon landing is much more difficult due to its gravity, as seen in a number of recent failures.
Last year, a probe belonging to Japanese startup ispace Inc crashed onto the moon’s surface, and Russia’s Luna 25 followed suit.
A lander from US startup Astrobotic Technology last week suffered a fuel leak, forcing it to abandon a touchdown attempt.
JAXA says it will take up to a month to verify whether SLIM has achieved its high-precision goals after touchdown.
Star Wars-like probe on board
On board Japan’s Moon Sniper spacecraft is a little robot with a big mission: to pop open like a Transformer toy, wiggle across the lunar surface and beam images back to Earth.
The shape-shifting SORA-Q probe – codeveloped by a major toy company – has been compared with a friendly Star Wars droid and a sea turtle because of the way its metal form can navigate the dusty moonscape.
Sora means “universe” in Japanese, while “Q” refers to the words “question” and “quest”, its makers say.
Slightly bigger than a tennis ball and weighing as much as a large potato – eight centimetres (three inches) across and 250 grams (half a pound) – SORA-Q was designed by JAXA with Takara Tomy, the toy company behind the original 1984 Transformers.
After landing on the moon, the probe’s cameras are expected to take valuable images of a crater where parts of the moon’s mantle, usually hidden deep below its crust, are believed to be exposed.
