Intuitive Machines’ Athena Lander Reaches the Moon Lopsided—Just like Its Predecessor
Despite some connection delays postlanding, the lunar lander Athena is officially set to study what lies beneath the moon’s surface over the next 10 days
Intuitive Machines’ IM-2 mission lunar lander, Athena, entering lunar orbit on Monday, March 3.
Athena, a commercially built spacecraft that is , has officially touched down on the moon—likely askew but functioning.
“We don’t believe we’re in the correct attitude on the surface of the moon—yet again,” said Intuitive Machines’ CEO Steve Altemus during a press conference held three and a half hours after the landing. “I can say, though, that we are charging [Athena’s batteries] on the surface…. We are communicating…. We can send commands to the vehicle.”
It may take another couple of days to lock down Athena’s exact positioning on the moon, officials said. But Athena is now indisputably operational on the lunar surface. It has joined Firefly Aerospace’s Blue Ghost, another commercial lander that made its moonfall on Sunday—upping the tally of active U.S. lunar surface missions to two. The back-to-back feats are considered important precursors to future crewed missions to the moon under NASA’s ambitious Artemis program.
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Tensions had run high near the end of the live watch party for Athena’s landing, which ended abruptly without a conclusive declaration of the lander’s overall health. “We can confirm Athena is on the surface of the moon,” said Intuitive Machines’ communication director Josh Marshall, somewhat tersely, at around 12:52 P.M. EST—20 minutes after the intended touchdown time. “We are working to figure out the orientation of the vehicle, which is important because those are our antenna systems that will determine how much signal we’re going to have” to determine Athena’s exact orientation. Later NASA also confirmed on X (formerly Twitter) that Athena had touched down on the moon at approximately 12:30 P.M. EST as planned.
Unlike Blue Ghost’s 45-day voyage to the moon, Athena’s lasted for little more than a week. The spacecraft launched on February 26 and entered lunar orbit on March 3. From there it orbited the moon for about three days (while sending back live beauty shots). It then started its descent from orbit for landing early in the morning on March 6. And at 12:15 P.M. EST, Athena began its final maneuvers toward the surface. While most of the landing procedures unfolded without issue, no decisive announcements were made about the state of the vehicle as of 12:31 P.M. EST, which was when it was supposed to land. For the next 20 minutes, the mission room bustled with activity as scientists—and Altemus—joined operators in trying to figure out what was happening.
In some ways, the landing attempt was a chance at redemption for Intuitive Machines after Odysseus, Athena’s predecessor, had a skewed lunar touchdown that hindered its surface operations. Unfortunately, Athena appears to have suffered a similar fate. It’s worth noting, however, that even by merely reaching the surface, Athena has already brought humanity the closest we’ve ever been to the resource-rich lunar south pole—specifically, to Mons Mouton, a plateau that may be a landing spot for future Artemis astronauts as well. “We’re definitely on Mons Mouton,” confirmed Tim Crain, Intuitive Machines’ chief growth officer, during the press conference.
Although its likely skewed position may reduce its capabilities, Athena nonetheless brings to the moon particularly rich array of demonstrations. For instance, NASA’s PRIME-1 (Polar Resources Ice Mining Experiment 1) is a two-part instrument consisting of a drill and a mass spectrometer that will chemically analyze samples of lunar soil to search for the water ice and other volatile substances thought to exist in abundance in the crater-pocked terrain of the lunar south pole. Once such reservoirs have been scouted out, subsequent missions might potentially mine them for manufacturing potable water, breathable air and even potent rocket fuel. And then there’s the Micro Nova Hopper, also developed by Intuitive Machines with NASA funding, which will seek to demonstrate a new mode of lunar locomotion with a series of incremental hops toward a nearby 20-meter-deep, permanently shadowed crater.
For the next 10 days, both Athena and Blue Ghost are planned to operate around the clock at their respective locations: Athena is near the south pole, and Blue Ghost is around Mare Crisium, a crater on the moon’s northeastern near side. The landers will also be there during a total lunar eclipse, as seen from Earth, as the moon passes through our planet’s shadow and gains a bloodred glow on the night of March 13 and the early morning of March 14.
Despite the setbacks in establishing communications, Athena is the third successful lunar landing of NASA’s CLPS initiative. (The first CLPS mission, Astrobotic’s Peregrine lander, suffered a propellant leak after its January 2024 launch that prevented it from reaching the moon at all.) In all, CLPS has booked $2.6 billion for various payloads and launches through 2028, each intended to incrementally progress U.S. readiness for a crewed lunar return. Currently, 14 different companies have been selected by NASA to deliver different payloads of science and technology experiments to the moon. For example, some of Blue Ghost’s payloads are demonstrating how to clean hardware caked in hazardous moon dust and how to run radiation-hardened computers on the lunar surface.
“With each CLPS mission, the United States is leading the way in expanding our reach and refining our capabilities, turning what was once dreams into reality,” said NASA acting Administrator Janet Petro in a press release that immediately followed Athena’s departure from Earth.
The U.S. is not alone, however, in its commercial efforts to rekindle lunar exploration. Japan’s Resilience lunar lander, built by the private company ispace, launched alongside Blue Ghost in January but is taking a much slower trajectory toward its destination. This launch marked a first in spaceflight history: never before had three landers been simultaneously bound for the moon. Meanwhile other nations—most notably China—continue their own programs of lunar exploration, with an eye toward independent human landings there.
“That’s building, improving and shipping a new spacecraft to go to the moon in nine months,” said Crain, who expressed that he previously had some reservations about how Athena’s improvements, compared with Odysseus, would perform out in space. And in many ways, Athena exceeded expectations, he said. “The future is bright for Intuitive Machines to land lots and lots of cargo on the moon,” Crain added.
Editor’s Note (3/6/25): This article was edited after posting to include updates on the status of Athena.
Gayoung Lee is Scientific American’s current news intern. A philosopher turned journalist, originally from South Korea, Lee’s interests lie in finding unexpected connections between life and science, particularly in theoretical physics and mathematics. You can read more about her here: https://gayoung-lee.carrd.co
Source: www.scientificamerican.com