Small step for humanity but big step for “ Jaxa » the Japanese space agency. After a successful entry into the orbit of the Moon on December 25, the Smart Lander for Investigating Moon (SLIM) successfully landed on the surface of the Moon last Saturday just 55 meters from its target, the Japanese space agency announced this Thursday.
The objective of landing this module within a radius of 100 meters from its target, compared to several kilometers in general for lunar missions, has therefore been achieved.
A feat for Japan
Jaxa also published on Thursday the first images of this moon landing, which represented an unprecedented feat for Japan, which became the fifth country in the world to succeed in landing on the Earth’s natural satellite after the United States, the USSR , China and India. But the Japanese feat was accompanied by a serious downside: SLIM (Smart Lander for Investigating Moon) experienced a problem with its solar panels, which forced Jaxa to turn off its power supply less than three hours after its moon landing, to save its batteries for a possible restart later. Jaxa believes it is possible that SLIM’s solar panels will work again when the angle of the sun at the moon landing site changes.
SLIM landed in a small crater less than 300 meters in diameter, called Shioli, and was able to land its two mini-rovers normally, supposed to carry out analyzes of rocks coming from the internal structure of the Moon (the lunar mantle), again very poorly known.