After three months of nights, the Japanese lunar probe failed to restore communication with the ground

Observer.com

2024-06-27 22:17Official account of Observer.com

On June 27, local time, the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) announced on the social media X platform that from June 21 to 27, the agency tried to resume communication with the probe "Small Moon Landing Demonstration Vehicle" (SLIM), which landed on the moon in January this year, but failed to get any response. JAXA believes that it is unlikely that communication with the probe will be established in the future.

JAXA said it is rapidly analyzing observational data from the probe and has not yet determined plans for the future. However, the statement stressed that the original design of SLIM was not to overcome the cold nights of the moon, and that the probe had obtained all the target data before the first moon night, so the current situation will not affect the results of the SLIM mission.

Japan's Asahi Shimbun newspaper said that JAXA tried to communicate with the SLIM detector in late May when sunlight hit the solar panels of the SLIM detector, but received no response at the time. Japan's Kyodo News Agency said that after successfully spending three months of night, the mission of the SLIM probe is over.

Images taken by LEV-2, a small probe aboard SLIM, show SLIM landing on the surface of the moon in an "upside-down" manner (JAXA)

Japan's SLIM probe landed on the surface of the moon at 00:20 Tokyo time on January 20 (23:20 Beijing time on January 19), and its main mission is to verify the precision landing technology for future lunar exploration and planetary exploration missions.

JAXA said that the probe successfully landed on the edge of the Shioli crater near the moon's equator, and the actual landing site was about 55 meters east of the intended target site, with an error of less than 100 meters, achieving the main task of the demonstration of "precision landing technology with 100-meter accuracy".

However, during the descent of the SLIM probe, one of the engines lost power, causing the probe to roll over during landing, the solar panels failed to face the direction of the sun, and the batteries were unable to generate electricity properly. In order to avoid permanent damage to the probe caused by over-discharge, the mission team turned off the power of the probe two hours after landing with a ground command.

But as the direction of sunlight hitting the moon's surface changed, the SLIM probe's solar panels later resumed generating electricity. On January 28, local time, the SLIM probe resumed its work and established communication with the ground. However, the probe was in operation for only a few hours that day before the power went off again.

The Asahi Shimbun newspaper said that since then, the SLIM probe has re-established communication with the ground several times. Although the rover was not originally designed to overcome the cold nights of the moon, the probe spent a total of 3 months and nights, with most of the equipment operating longer than expected.

SLIM is Japan's third probe to challenge the moon. In November 2022, the Japanese probe "Hospitable" CubeSat had an abnormal attitude after separating from the rocket, and the solar panels did not work properly, failing to establish communication with the ground. In April 2023, the Hakutu-R, a lunar probe of the Japanese private space company ispace, ran out of fuel and crashed on the surface of the moon after an error in its judgment of altitude during landing.

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