Japan’s Moon Probe SLIM Survives Second Lunar Night

Japan's unmanned moon lander, the Smart Lander for Investigating Moon (SLIM), has once again defied expectations by surviving a second frigid lunar night. The Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) announced the probe's surprise awakening on X, formerly Twitter, confirming that SLIM had successfully completed its second overnight.

The SLIM probe made history in January by becoming the fifth spacecraft to touch down on the lunar surface without crashing. However, the landing was not without its challenges. The lightweight spacecraft landed at an angle that left its solar panels facing the wrong direction.

Despite these initial difficulties, SLIM has continued to transmit valuable data back to Earth. A black-and-white photo of a lunar crater's rocky surface accompanied JAXA's post on SLIM's official account. The agency reported that the probe had recorded images of the lunar landscape with its navigational camera, among other activities.

This news comes in the wake of the failure of the American lander, Odysseus. The first private spaceship to successfully land on the moon, Odysseus, was unable to wake up after the lunar night. Its manufacturer, Houston-based Intuitive Machines, had hoped that Odysseus might revive like SLIM but declared the mission over on Saturday.

JAXA has dubbed SLIM the "Moon Sniper" for its precision landing technology. The probe's mission is to examine a part of the moon's mantle, the deep inner layer beneath its crust, believed to be accessible at the crater where it landed.

After its touchdown on January 20, JAXA remotely switched off the lander to save power. As the sun's angle shifted, the probe came back to life in late January and carried out scientific observations of a crater with a high-spec camera.

The SLIM saga has been a boon for JAXA, especially after a string of high-profile failures, including two previous Japanese lunar missions. Despite these setbacks, Japan's space fortunes have been mixed this year. In February, JAXA celebrated a successful blast-off for its new flagship H3 rocket. However, a different rocket made by Tokyo-based company Space One exploded into flames in a spectacular failure for the start-up's bid to put a satellite into orbit.