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Mansa Musa was the ruler of the Mali Empire in West Africa. Details recorded here should be sourced; unknown information is left blank.
MORE →Reflects the personal views, recollections, and perspective of the author, Mike Davis.
This is a personal recollection on the Move fire on May 13, 1985
 Full-size model of Hakuto-R | |
| Mission type | Lunar lander / Technology |
|---|---|
| Operator | ispace |
| COSPAR ID | 2022-168A |
| SATCAT no. | 54696 |
| Website | ispace-inc |
| Mission duration | 135 days, 9 hours, 2 minutes |
| Spacecraft properties | |
| Spacecraft | Hakuto-R |
| Manufacturer | ispace |
| Launch mass | 1,000 kg (2,200 lb) |
| Dry mass | 340 kg (750 lb) |
| Dimensions | 2.3 × 2.6 m (7.5 × 8.5 ft) |
| Start of mission | |
| Launch date | 11 December 2022, 07:38 UTC |
| Rocket | Falcon 9 Block 5 B1073-5 |
| Launch site | CCSFS, SLC-40 |
| Contractor | SpaceX |
| Moon impact (failed landing) | |
| Impact date | 25 April 2023, 16:40 UTC |
| Impact site | Atlas crater 47°34′52″N 44°05′38″E / 47.581°N 44.094°E |
 Hakuto-R Mission 1 patch | |
Hakuto-R Mission 1 was a failed private Japanese uncrewed lunar landing mission built and operated by ispace, which was launched in December 2022 for an attempted lunar landing in April 2023.
This first Hakuto mission was primarily a technology demonstrator and carried the Emirates Lunar Mission.[1] Travelling approximately 1,400,000 kilometres (870,000 mi), it is the furthest a privately funded spacecraft has traveled.[2] Communication with the lander was lost during the final seconds of its April 2023 descent.[3]
The project began with engineer Andrew Barton in 2008, who sought to win the Google Lunar X Prize by landing a privately funded rover on the Moon, and gathered an international group of professionals to create White Label Space.[3] Takeshi Hakamada would found ispace in 2010 as a Japanese branch of White Label Space[3] Many of the professionals abandoned the project by 2013, though a group of Japanese members sought to continue with the project, which was renamed from White Label Space to Hakuto, based on the white Hare of Inaba in Japanese mythology.[3][4] By 2017, ispace had secured $90 million in funding and though no teams in the Google Lunar X Prize ever launched before the 2018 deadline, the Hakuto team would continue.[3] In April 2022, iSpace was placed on the Tokyo Stock Exchange, receiving a 65% increase in its share price within two weeks.[3]
The Hakuto-R lander was measured at 2.3 metres (7.5 ft) tall by 2.6 metres (8.5 ft) wide, with a total weight of approximately 1,000 kilograms (2,200 lb) with its payload and fuel.[5] To perform a stable landing, the lander was equipped with four landing legs and a main thruster.[5]
Hakuto-R Mission 1 was launched on 11 December 2022 aboard a Falcon 9 rocket,[6] separating from the rocket 47 minutes later at a distance around 970 kilometres (600 mi) away from Earth.[3] Inside the spacecraft were payloads from the Emirates Lunar Mission rover Rashid in a partnership with the Mohammed bin Rashid Space Centre (MBRSC), along with Tomy and JAXA's Sora-Q transformable lunar robot.[2][7][8] The lander also housed another payload, a music disc featuring the song 'SORATO' by the Japanese rock band Sakanaction, which was initially released in 2018 as a part of the Team Hakuto campaign for the Google Lunar X Prize.[9]
Using data collected from a previous lunar scanning mission, ispace determined that the mission would attempt a landing in the Atlas crater in the Mare Frigoris region of the Moon; three other backup locations were selected, like those in Lacus Somniorum, Sinus Iridum and Oceanus Procellarum, among others.[5][9] In an effort to conserve fuel, the mission used a slower path to approach the Moon, entering lunar orbit in March 2023.[5]
After a five-month travel time, the mission traveled 1,400,000 kilometres (870,000 mi), further than any privately funded spacecraft, to attempt a lunar landing on 25 April 2023.[2][10]
During the official live-stream,[11] among the four possible landing locations, the site in Lacus Somniorum was initially shown in the animation, saying it was based on real-time telemetry from the lander; that later turned out to be misleading, since the telemetry coming from the lander was not reliable, and the actual attempted landing site was near Atlas crater, as had been decided initially.[12][13][9]
Communication with the lander was lost during the final moments of descent to the lunar surface at 16:40 UTC (00:40 JST) on 25 April[3] Analysis determined that the lander plummeted uncontrollably when the propellant was exhausted. This happened because the onboard computer incorrectly presumed the radar altimeter was faulty, and ignoring its data, misjudged the actual altitude of the spacecraft and kept hovering 5 km above the surface of the Moon.[3][14][15][16]
The crash site was later identified by NASA's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter team on 23 May 2023.[12]
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Source: Wikipedia. Article content is retrieved live through the MediaWiki API.
Hakuto-R Mission 1 was a failed private Japanese uncrewed lunar landing mission built and operated by ispace, which was launched in December 2022 for an attempted lunar landing in April 2023. This first Hakuto mission was primarily a technology demonstrator and carried the Emirates Lunar Mission. Travelling approximately 1,400,000 kilometres (870,000 mi), it is the furthest a privately funded spacecraft has traveled. Communication with the lander was lost during the final seconds of its April 2023 descent.
Hakuto-R Mission 2, also called Resilience, was a robotic lunar landing mission launched on 15 January 2025. Developed by the Japanese company ispace, the lander was intended to deliver a small rover manufactured by the company's European subsidiary, as well as other payloads. Like Hakuto-R Mission 1, this mission served as a technology demonstration, with the final goal of providing reliable transportation and data services on the Moon. The lander was named RESILIENCE. Communications were lost approximately 90 seconds before the projected landing and the lander crashed on the Moon.
ispace Inc. is a publicly traded Japanese company developing robotic spacecraft and other technology to compete for both transportation and exploration mission contracts from space agencies and other private industries. ispace's mission is to enable its clients to discover, map, and use natural lunar resources. From 2013 to 2018, ispace was the owner and operator of the Hakuto team that competed in Google Lunar X Prize (GLXP). The team developed a lunar rover named Sorato. ispace is headquartered in Tokyo, Japan, with offices in the United States and Luxembourg. The company's founder and CEO is Takeshi Hakamada. ispace's Hakuto-R program, supported by Japanese funding and partnered with American Draper Laboratory, aims to offer lunar transport and exploration. Hakuto-R Mission 1, launched in December 2022 carrying the Rashid rover, failed during its April 2023 landing attempt. Hakuto-R Mission 2, launched in January 2025 with the RESILIENCE lander and a UNESCO "memory disk," also failed to establish communication after its attempted landing in June 2025, suggesting a hard landing. Future lander missions, starting with Mission 3 in 2028, will focus on establishing high-frequency, cost-effective lunar transport and lunar water resource development.
Blue Ghost Mission 1 was a robotic Moon landing mission conducted by Firefly Aerospace (Firefly). The spacecraft soft-landed on the lunar surface on March 2, 2025, making Firefly the first commercial company to complete a fully successful soft landing on the Moon. As part of NASA's Commercial Lunar Payload Services program, the mission delivered ten scientific and technological experiments to advance future human exploration under the Artemis program. About 5 hours after lunar sunset on March 16, 2025, the solar-powered lander's batteries depleted and communications were lost. The mission's end was officially declared at 23:25 UTC. The Blue Ghost lunar lander was launched from Kennedy Space Center on January 15, 2025, using a SpaceX Falcon 9 Block 5 rocket that also carried the Hakuto-R Mission 2 lander. At 08:34 UTC on March 2, 2025, it delivered 10 payloads to the lunar surface within Mare Crisium, a 500-kilometer-wide (310 mi) lunar basin. Its 60-day mission aimed to analyze lunar regolith, study geophysical characteristics, and investigate interactions between the solar wind and Earth's magnetic field. The lander's scientific payloads included a regolith adherence characterization experiment, a lunar retroreflector for precision distance measurements, a radiation-tolerant computer, thermal exploration probes, and more. All 10 NASA payloads (including GNSS tracking, heliospheric X-ray imaging, magnetotelluric sounder, and a radiation‑tolerant computer) powered on, collected data, and transmitted over 110 GB back to Earth.
Before the 1921 destruction of Tulsa’s Greenwood District, Black residents had created a remarkable center of business and community life. The district included stores, professional offices, entertainment venues and homes owned by Black citizens. Understanding Greenwood means learning what was built—not only what was burned.
MORE →Shirley Chisholm, elected in 1968.
