- Feathers fly at Chanel's Paris fashion return
- UAE oil giant ADNOC swoops on German chemicals firm Covestro
- Eurozone inflation falls under 2% for first time since 2021
- Coldplay ticket scalping fiasco sparks backlash in India
- Droughts drive Spanish boom in pistachio farming
- Tokyo recovers some losses to lead Asian markets higher
- Rural schools empty in North Macedonia due to exodus
- US dockworkers launch strike after labor contract expires
- Thousands evacuated as Super Typhoon Krathon approaches Taiwan
- Kenya airport whistleblower fears for his life
- Sheinbaum to take office as Mexico's first woman president
- Scientists fear underfunded Argentina research on verge of collapse
- US port officials gird for strike despite last-minute bargaining
- With 118 dead from Hurricane Helene, Biden defends US government response
- Breeder who tried to create enormous trophy sheep jailed in US
- Qatar Airways seeking 25% stake in Virgin Australia
- US port officials gird for strike as labor talks stay stuck
- As toll crosses 100, Trump puts Hurricane Helene at election center stage
- US Fed Chair sees 'further disinflation' in economy
- Epic Games sues Google and Samsung over app store
- Officials see no shortages from likely US port strike
- UK families of Gaza hostages warn Lebanon attack 'takes focus away'
- Shares in Stellantis, Aston Martin skid on profit warnings
- Dali prints found in London garage sold at auction
- ECB chief backs bank mergers amid UniCredit, Commerzbank talk
- China stocks soar on stimulus, but US and Europe retreat
- 100 dead in storm Helene damage, flooding across US southeast
- China stocks soar on stimulus, Europe slides on automaker woes
- German antitrust watchdog steps up monitoring of Microsoft
- Nepal's urban poor count cost of 'nightmare' floods
- E.Guinea, Gabon clash at ICJ over oil-rich islands
- New blow for UK's Starmer as growth data disappoints
- China's top banks to tweak mortgage rates to boost housing market
- Muslim women break taboos navigating east London's waterways
- Nepal dam-building spree powers electric vehicle boom
- More than 60 dead from storm Helene as rescue, cleanup efforts grow
- Dozens missing, 9 dead in migrant boat wreck off Spanish Canaries
- Death toll from Hurricane John hits eight in Mexico
- Storm Helene's toll rises as rescue and cleanup efforts gain pace
- SpaceX launches mission to return stranded astronauts
- Storm Helene kills 44, threatens more 'catastrophic' flooding as cleanup begins
- SpaceX set to launch mission to return stranded astronauts
- Storm Helene kills 44, threatens more 'catastrophic' flooding
- Boeing strike grinds on as latest talks fail to reach agreement
- Iran 'news' sites, hackers target Trump ahead of US election
- US ports brace for potential dockworkers strike
- Japan's speedy, spotless Shinkansen bullet trains turn 60
- US hurricane deaths rise to 44, fears of more 'catastrophic' flooding
- Global stocks mostly rise, cheering Beijing stimulus
- Europe en route for Moon with new simulator, says astronaut Pesquet
US prestige at stake as Texas company launches for the Moon
Another month, another Moonshot: An American spaceship attempting a lunar landing is to launch early Wednesday, the second private-led effort this year after the first ended in failure.
Intuitive Machines, the Houston-based company leading mission "IM-1," is aiming to become the first company to achieve a soft touchdown on Earth's celestial sibling, and land the first US robot on the surface since the Apollo 17 mission in 1972.
Its golf cart-sized Nova-C lander named "Odysseus" will blast off on top of a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida at 12:57 am local time (0557 GMT).
"We understand and welcome the responsibility of our IM-1 and mission as we hope to become the first commercial company to successfully land on the Moon," the company's Trent Martin told reporters.
It is due reach its landing site Malapert A on February 22, an impact crater 300 kilometers (180 miles) from the south pole, where NASA hopes to eventually build a long term presence and harvest ice for both drinking water and rocket fuel under Artemis, its flagship Moon-to-Mars program.
- Back to the Moon -
NASA paid Intuitive Machines $118 million to ship science hardware to better understand and mitigate environmental risks for astronauts, the first of whom are scheduled to land no sooner than 2026.
The instruments include cameras to document the effect of engine plume on the surface, a device to analyze dust haze that appears during lunar twilight, and precision landing technology that uses pulses of light from a laser.
NASA scientist Susan Lederer said the mission would go further south than any lander has been on the Moon "and will give us an opportunity to test our instruments in this very harsh environment where the Sun is always low on horizon."
There is also more colorful cargo aboard, including a digital archive of human knowledge and 125 mini-sculptures of the Moon by the artist Jeff Koons.
After touchdown, the payloads are expected to run for roughly seven days before lunar night sets in on the south pole, rendering Odysseus inoperable.
IM-1 is the second mission under a NASA initiative called Commercial Lunar Payload Services (CLPS), which the space agency created to delegate trucking services to the private sector to achieve savings and to stimulate a wider lunar economy.
The first, by Pittsburgh-based Astrobotic, launched in January, but its Peregrine spacecraft was hit by an onboard explosion that caused a fuel leak, and was eventually brought back to burn up in Earth's atmosphere.
- Busy calendar -
Soft landing a robot on the Moon is challenging because a spaceship has to navigate treacherous terrain amid a lag of several seconds in communications with Earth, and use its thrusters for a controlled descent in the absence of an atmosphere that would support parachutes.
Only five nations have succeeded: the Soviet Union was first, then the United States, which is still the only country to also put people on the surface.
In America's long absence, China has landed three times since 2013, India in 2023, and Japan was the latest, last month -- though its robot has struggled to stay powered on after a wonky touchdown left its solar panels pointing the wrong way.
Apart from Astrobotic's failed attempt, two other private initiatives got close: Beresheet, operated by an Israeli nonprofit, crash landed in 2019, while Japanese company ispace also had a "hard landing" last year.
Intuitive Machines has two more launches scheduled for this year, while another Texas company, Firefly Aerospace has one too. Astrobotic will get another shot in late 2024, carrying a NASA rover to the south pole.
Ng.A.Adebayo--CPN