If all goes well, it would mark the first time a private firm has successfully landed a spacecraft on the Moon.
If this mission is successful , it would make Intuitive Machines the first private company to land on the Moon. It would also be the first US landing there since Nasa’s Apollo 17 mission in 1972. And it would prove that commercial lunar missions have a future. The US space agency Nasa has funded this project - it’s not the first attempt. Two missions by other companies have already failed.
SpaceIL’s Beresheet and ispace’s Hakuto-R both crash-landed and were destroyed. It’s not just about getting to the Moon - Odysseus is also carrying lots of scientific instruments and cameras to discover more about the Moon. One will measure how the landing itself kicks up plumes of lunar dust . And the lander won’t be alone - 125 tiny sculptures by the artist Jeff Koons are also on board, as well as a chip that aims to establish an archive of human knowledge on the Moon.
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