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Quick thinking and a stroke of luck averted a moon lander disaster for Intuitive Machines
Intuitive Machines' spacecraft touched down yesterday on the lunar surface... sideways. CEO Steve Altemus confirmed during a press conference Friday that,
Intuitive Machines confirmed yesterday that the lander touched down on the surface at 5:24 p.m. Central Time — making the company the first to put a privately-built spacecraft on the moon — but many details about the vehicle’s health were unknown. These lasers determine critical variables for landing, like altitude and horizontal velocity; with them non-functional, Odysseus could’ve succumbed to the fate of so many other landers and crashed on the surface. They directed Odysseus to orbit the moon for an additional two-hour period, to give them more time to load software patches and reset the lander’s guidance, navigation and control system.
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