Moon Missions

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       Japan Becomes the Latest Country to Land on the Moon Share full article

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       People at a public viewing event of the SLIM mission in Sagamihara, Japan, reacted as the spacecraft ended its descent. “We believe the soft landing was successful,” Hitoshi Kuninaka, a JAXA official, said. Credit...Kim Kyung-Hoon/Reuters

       By Kenneth Chang

       Jan. 19, 2024Updated 1:54 p.m. ET

       A Japanese robotic spacecraft successfully set down on the moon on Friday — but its solar panels were not generating power, which will cut the length of time it will be able to operate to a few hours.

       With this achievement, Japan is now the fifth country to send a spacecraft that made a soft landing on the moon.

       For JAXA, Japan’s space agency which currently operates a variety of robotic science missions in space, this was the first time it had tried to set down on a planetary body elsewhere in the solar system. The spacecraft, the Smart Lander for Investigating Moon, or SLIM, was intended to demonstrate precision landing, within a football field of a targeted destination rather than an uncertainty of miles that most landers are capable of.

       The technology could also be useful for future missions like those in NASA’s Artemis program . Japan is a partner in that program, which will send astronauts back to the moon in the coming years.

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       Kenneth Chang has been at The Times since 2000, writing about physics, geology, chemistry, and the planets. Before becoming a science writer, he was a graduate student whose research involved the control of chaos. More about Kenneth Chang

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       Highlights From Japan’s Robotic Moon Landing Japan is preparing for an important rocket launch.

       Japan has other missions exploring the solar system.

       Recent moon landing missions have a mixed record.

       A Japanese telescope that launched with SLIM released its first cosmic views.

       How SLIM will try to land on the moon.

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