Historic Japanese spacecraft has Moon mishap after landing on its nose

By Dean Murray via SWNS

A historic Japanese spacecraft has had a Moon mishap - after landing on its nose.

The stricken Slim spacecraft lander touched down on 20 January, but now a picture beamed back by its tiny robot companion shows it rotated 90 degrees from how it should be.

The image was captured by the Sora-Q, or LEV-2, rover that was ejected from Slim moments before touchdown.

Japanese space agency Jaxa believe that Slim could not generate power from its solar cells, as the thrust from one of the two main engines was most likely lost.

They explained in a statement on Thursday (25 January): "The descent velocity at the time of contact with the ground was approximately 1.4 m/s or less, which was below the design range, but conditions such as the lateral velocity and attitude were outside the design range, and this is thought to have resulted in a different attitude than planned."

JAXA say they are analyzing data which shows that Slim's solar cells are currently facing west, suggesting that there is the possibility for power generation.

They say: "Although Slim's activities on the Moon were originally expected to last only a few days, the necessary preparations for recovery will continue in order to acquire further technical and scientific data."