The Peregrine One mission, named after the fastest animal on Earth, took off from the Cape Canaveral Spaceport in Florida. The American landing module is to land on the moon for the first time in more than 50 years after the completion of the Apollo project.
This is reported by the Financial Times.
The start took place at 02:18 a.m. local time (09:18 Kyiv time).
The Vulcan Centaur rocket, built by United Launch Alliance, is carrying Pittsburgh-based Astroboticʼs Peregrine lunar lander, which separated about 50 minutes after launch.
If the lander reaches the surface of the satellite safely, it will be the first successful commercial mission to the Moon. Last year, Japanʼs iSpace attempt failed when its lander crashed on the surface of the moon. Peregrine is expected to arrive at the Moon around February 23.
CEO of Astrobotic said the launch marked the "dawn of a new era" for space exploration.
"This is an opportunity for commercial payloads to regularly fly to the moon. This means that the moon will become more accessible to our scientists than ever before," he said from the control room at Cape Canaveral.
Perigrine One is the first of eight planned missions under NASAʼs commercial lunar payload services initiative. This is a vital step in NASAʼs Artemis space program, which aims to return humans to the moon for the first time since the end of the Apollo program in 1972.
The Peregrine lander is carrying 20 payloads, including five NASA scientific instruments and cargo from the Ukrainian-British company Spacebit, which sent, among other things, a metal version of the flag of Ukraine to the moon as part of a scientific mission.
A metal plate with a map and flag of Ukraine that went to the moon.
nauka.ua / X
Paints on the plate can withstand extreme temperature conditions for hundreds of years. A copy of it was presented to the President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky at the end of 2021.
The Vulcan Centaur rocket is also on a second mission from Celestis, the space memorial group that sends the cremated remains and DNA of the actors and creators of the 1960s Star Trek television series into space, eventually orbiting the sun in safety.
The mission also carries the DNA of former US presidents George Washington, Dwight Eisenhower and John F. Kennedy, as well as the DNA of a goat, blood samples from 33 artists, hundreds of images, poems and pieces of music, ocean water and a plate, the symbol of Bitcoin.
Before the launch of the rocket, the Navajo Indians made a last-ditch effort to stop the flight, arguing that such commercial missions were tantamount to desecrating the moon, which is sacred to many cultures.