During the night from Friday to Saturday, a Japanese spacecraft will attempt to land on the moon, with unequaled precision. An astonishing technological feat for this 4th world economic power, which would be the 5th country in the history of space to achieve this.
The descent towards the Moon of the Slim module (Smart Lander for Investigating Moon) should begin around midnight Saturday Japanese time (Friday 3 p.m. GMT) and should last around twenty minutes, according to the Japanese space agency Jaxa. This small unmanned spacecraft (2.4 m long, 1.7 m wide and 2.7 m high) must not only land, but also land within a radius of 100 meters from its target, radius considered a high degree of precision. Hence his nickname “Moon sniper”.
It is common for lunar vehicles to land several kilometers from their target, which can complicate their exploration missions. And the moon landing is more difficult than landing on asteroids – a feat already achieved, including by Jaxa – because gravity on the Moon is stronger than on small celestial bodies.
Landing precisely on the Moon is “a huge challenge” for SLIM, Emily Brunsden, director of the Astrocampus at the University of York, told AFP. The precision of the “Sniper” constitutes “an enormous technological progress which will make it possible to design missions aimed at answering much more specific research questions”.
But achieving this feat is “exceptionally technologically difficult”. “There is usually only one chance, so even the slightest mistake can result in mission failure,” she warns. SLIM must land in a small crater less than 300 meters in diameter called Shioli, from where the machine should be able to carry out ground analyzes of rocks believed to come from the lunar mantle, the internal structure of the Earth’s natural satellite, which is still very poorly known.