Fuel leak on Astrobotic's moon lander leaves 'no chance' of soft landing (updated)

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09/01/2024 18:04

(Adds background throughout, details on the mission in
paragraph 2,5,6)
       WASHINGTON, Jan 9 (Reuters) - Astrobotic's Peregrine
lunar lander has "no chance" of a soft landing on the moon after
springing a propellant leak in the first few hours of its
journey in space, the company said on Tuesday about the first
such U.S. attempt in five decades.
    There was 40 hours of fuel left on the lander that will
allow it to operate "as a spacecraft" even as engineers
determine what its new mission in orbit will be, the space
robotics firm said.
    The craft was launched aboard the first flight of Vulcan, a
rocket that had been under development for a decade by United
Launch Alliance (ULA), a joint venture of Boeing  BA.N  and
Lockheed Martin  LMT.N .
    The lander was launched successfully at 2:18 a.m. ET on
Monday from Cape Canaveral, Florida, but it suffered a
propulsion system issue enroute to the moon.
        After the launch, the lander failed to enter its correct
sun-facing orientation in space and saw its battery levels
plummet, but Astrobotic was able to fix the issue, the company
said.
        "The team continues to work to find ways to extend 
Peregrine's operational life," it said, adding that engineers
are receiving data and proving spaceflight operations for
components and software related to its next lunar lander
mission.

 (Reporting by Joey Roulette in Washington D.C. and Akash Sriram
in Bengaluru; Editing by Chizu Nomiyama and Arun Koyyur)
 ((Joey.Roulette@thomsonreuters.com; 7034696632;))