The laser navigator collided with the moon earlier this month, dooming a Japanese company’s lunar landing craft.
ISPACE officials announced the news from Tokyo on Tuesday. Crush Landing was iSpace’s second in two years.
This time, the company’s lander, named Resilience, was heading north north of the moon in Mare Frigoris or Sea of Clow. NASA’s Moon Reconnaissance Orbiter relayed photos of the crash site where Resilience and its mini-rover became wreckage last week.
Company officials condemned the accident with Lander’s laser rangefinder, saying it was slow to kick in and properly measure the spacecraft’s distance to the moon. Resilience fell at a rapid rate of 138 feet (42 meters) per second when contact was lost, and crashed five seconds later, they said.
Bad software hit the moon in 2023 with Ispace’s first lunar lander. Like the latest attempt, the problem occurred at the final stage of the descent.
Of the seven lunar landing attempts in recent years with private costumes, only one can claim complete success. Blue Ghost was launched on Resilience in January and shared SpaceX Rocket Ride from Florida.
Except for the Texas-based Fireflies, only five countries have retracted the successful lunar landings of the Soviet Union, the US, China, India and Japan. And over half a century ago, during NASA’s Apollo program, they placed astronauts on the moon astronauts.
Despite consecutive losses, ISPACE is moving forward with its third lunar landing attempt in 2027, along with NASA’s cooperation and a fourth planning mission. Additional testing and improvements add 1.5 billion yen (over $10 million) to development costs, officials said.
CEO and founder hakhi stressed that his company “has not resigned in the face of a set-up,” and that he is trying to regain the trust of its customers. External experts will take part in the review of the accident, and Ispace will work more closely with the Japanese space agency on technical issues.
“We have taken the next step towards our future mission,” he said in Japanese.
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Original issue: June 23, 2025 9:39pm EDT
