The Odysseus moon lander is not standing upright on the lunar surface. Rather, it’s lying down on its side.
The telemetry data of the spacecraft suggests that, due to some software glitch with Odysseus’ internal navigation system, the lander had some horizontal velocity (lateral movements) at the moment of lunar touchdown. As a result, the lander could not keep itself upright.
Steve Altemus, CEO of Intuitive Machines, said in a press briefing that during its final descent, the lander was moving at 6 mph (9.7 km/h) in the vertical direction and at 2 mph (3.2 km/h) in the horizontal direction. However, to get an upright position, it was supposed to move at 0 mph in a horizontal direction.
Not only that, due to the complexity of Odysseus’ internal navigation system, its EagleCam camera, which was supposed to take pictures of the Odysseus lander, was not deployed during the final descent.
Related article: EagleCam captures no photos of Odysseus lander during the moon landing
As the space enthusiastic people are eagerly waiting for the Odysseus picture, the mission control team will try to deploy the EagleCam device to take pictures of the lander, Steve Altemus added.
He also added that Odysseus has softly landed near or at the intended landing site. However, its pinpoint location in the lunar south polar region is still unknown, and we’ll find out when NASA’s Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) flies over the landing site, likely this weekend.
Currently, most of the payloads that Odysseus lander carried on the lunar surface are operating, and its solar cell batteries are 100% charged.
As the duration of the mission is only 7 days, the team is currently busy taking scientific data.
Odysseus lunar lander captured Schomberger crater on the Moon before landing on February 22 when it was approximately 6 miles (10 km) above the lunar surface and approximately 125 miles (200 km) away from the intended landing site.
Related article: US private moon lander Odysseus makes historic lunar landing
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