SpaceX is gearing up for a historic Wednesday as it launched the world's first private lander to the moon, according to a report by AFP.
It will also be the first Japanese lander to touch the Moon.
The launch will take place at Cape Canaveral, Florida where a Falcon 9 rocket will be fired at 3:39 am (0839 GMT). If anything upends the plan, the backup launch date is set for Thursday.
Japanese Company iSpace
The first mission of a program dubbed Hakuto-R was launched by the Japan-based ispace.
According to a statement from the company, the lander would arrive in the Atlas crater on the visible side of the Moon around April 2023.
The lander's dimensions are slightly over 2 by 2.5 meters (6.5 by 8 feet), and it is equipped with a United Arab Emirates-built Rashid rover weighing 10 kilograms.
Although the Arab nation is new to the space competition, it has had recent achievements, including a Mars probe in 2020. Rashid will be the first Moon mission for the Arab region if everything goes as planned.
Hakuto was chosen as one of five finalists in the global Google Lunar XPrize competition, which failed to produce a victor. The competition's goal was to send a rover to the Moon by the year 2018 deadline. However, a few of the projects are still in progress.
The Israeli group SpaceIL, one of the candidates, crashed into the ground while attempting to land and was unable to succeed in becoming the first privately-funded mission to accomplish the feat in April 2019, as per AFP.
With only 200 workers on its yoke, ispace claims that by offering frequent, inexpensive transportation to the Moon, it will expand the realm of human life in space and foster a sustainable planet.
The Artemis program run by NASA is expected to benefit from such missions. An unmanned test flight to the Moon called Artemis-1 is currently in progress.
NASA hopes to establish a prolonged human presence on the moon by constructing a space station in lunar orbit and a facility on its surface.
It has given contracts to several businesses to create landers that will bring scientific research to the surface.
Two of these are the American firms Astrobotic and Intuitive Machines set to launch in 2023 and, if they pursue a more direct road, may beat ispace to their target.
NASA and SpaceX Agreement
NASA has recently granted SpaceX's request for a contract modification to expedite the construction of its Starship human landing system to achieve its objectives for long-term moon exploration under Artemis.
SpaceX will launch a second crewed landing demonstration mission in 2027 under NASA's Artemis IV mission.
"Returning astronauts to the Moon to learn, live, and work is a bold endeavor. With multiple planned landers, from SpaceX and future partners, NASA will be better positioned to accomplish the missions of tomorrow: conducting more science on the surface of the Moon than ever before and preparing for crewed missions to Mars," NASA Administrator Bill Nelson remarked in a press release statement.
