On Friday, June 6, Japanese space startup ispace announced a critical failure in its second lunar landing attempt. The uncrewed spacecraft, named Resilience, was set to touch down at Mare Frigoris—a basaltic plain near the Moon’s north pole—at approximately 4:17 a.m. Japan Standard Time. Having successfully entered lunar orbit after launching aboard SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket on January 8, 2025, Resilience began its hour‐long descent to the surface only to have its altitude reading plummet to zero just minutes before the expected touchdown. Since then, the company has been unable to reestablish communications with the lander, strongly suggesting a crash.
ispace’s Strategic Aims
Founded in 2010 by CEO Takeshi Hakamada, ispace set out to become the world’s first private company outside the United States to achieve a soft lunar landing. Its business model combines commercial payload delivery for scientific and technological experiments with the long‐term goal of developing lunar resource exploitation. Resilience carried five external payloads valued at roughly US $24 million, including instruments from Japanese firms, a Taiwanese university, and ispace’s own four‐wheeled lunar rover built by its Luxembourg subsidiary. The mission aimed to demonstrate precision landing capabilities, deploy the rover for two weeks of surface exploration, and gather critical data on regolith properties, all before the arrival of the lunar night’s extreme cold.
Descent Profile and Telemetry Breakdown
Resilience’s deorbit burn and positioning maneuvers had proceeded according to plan. Telemetry broadcast live to a public viewing event at ispace partner Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corporation in Tokyo indicated a stable descent trajectory until the final approach. Suddenly, altitude data—a key parameter fed by onboard radar altimeters—plunged to zero. At that moment, the streamed message from mission control declared, “We have not been able to confirm communication.” Onscreen, engineers’ expressions turned from anticipation to alarm. The abrupt loss implies a hard impact rather than a stable touchdown.
Past Lessons: The 2023 Mission Failure
This was not ispace’s first attempt. In April 2023, its inaugural lander—dubbed Hakuto-R 1—crashed during final descent. In that mission, a radar miscalibration led to an inaccurate altitude estimate, causing the throttle to reduce prematurely and the spacecraft to collide with the surface. Since then, ispace engineers have reworked the descent software, integrating expanded sensor fusion and redundant telemetry links, while largely retaining the original hardware. The recurrence of failure underscores the formidable challenges of lunar landing—especially for newcomer private enterprises operating on constrained budgets.
Global Competition in Commercial Lunar Landings
Resilience’s crash follows a string of high‐profile private lander missions:
• Intuitive Machines’ Odysseus (January 2024): The first-ever U.S. commercial soft lunar landing, touched down successfully near Oceanus Procellarum but suffered limited post‐landing operations due to communication issues.
• Intuitive Machines’ Athena (March 2025): The company’s second mission ended with the lander on its side, unable to deploy instruments.
• Firefly Aerospace’s Blue Ghost (March 2025): Launched alongside Resilience, this spacecraft achieved a nominal touchdown near the Moon’s south pole and continues to operate, sending back spectral analyses of lunar soil.
• JAXA’s SLIM (September 2024): Japan’s national space agency achieved the fifth soft lunar landing in history but came to rest tilted on its side, limiting its mission lifespan.
These missions highlight a new era in lunar exploration—shifting from exclusively national space agencies to a diverse mix of private and public stakeholders competing and collaborating to master landing technology and scientific payload delivery.
Payload Science: What May Be Lost
Resilience carried several science experiments:
– Regolith Analyzer: A spectrometer designed to measure mineral composition and suitability for in situ resource utilization.
– Thermal Probe: To record temperature gradients within the lunar soil and gauge insulation properties.
– Biological Exposure Unit: Small samples of microorganisms from Earth to test survivability in lunar conditions.
– Radiation Monitor: Measuring cosmic and solar particle flux at the lunar surface.
– Luxembourg Rover (Rover-1): A four‐wheeled vehicle equipped with cameras and a drill capable of collecting small soil samples for onboard analysis.
All these payloads depended on stable surface deployment and communications. The rover, in particular, was slated to travel up to 100 meters from the landing site, transmitting high‐resolution imagery. If Resilience did crash, the loss of these scientific instruments represents a setback for lunar science and for ispace’s aspiration to lead commercial lunar exploration.
Economic Impact: ispace’s Market Valuation
Shares of ispace soared earlier this year on renewed investor optimism following the Blue Ghost success and the promise of a second landing. By June 5, ispace commanded a market capitalization exceeding ¥110 billion (US $1.2 billion). However, news of Resilience’s failure has triggered an immediate sell‐off. Analysts estimate a short‐term market value decline of 20–30 percent, wiping out hundreds of millions of dollars in paper value. ispace’s financial future hinges on securing new investment, demonstrating technological resilience, and swiftly planning a third landing attempt—expected in 2026 under its Artemis team contract with NASA.
Government and Regulatory Response
The Japanese Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI), which provides oversight and grants export licenses for space hardware, expressed disappointment and pledged support for ispace. “We will work with ispace to analyze the failure, implement corrective actions, and ensure national leadership in lunar exploration,” said METI Minister Ken Saito.
The Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) also offered technical assistance: “JAXA stands ready to share orbital dynamics data and ground‐station support to help refine future ispace missions,” declared JAXA President Hiroshi Yamakawa.
Next Steps for ispace: Investigation and Redesign
ispace has convened an independent failure review board comprising flight‐software experts, aerospace engineers, and JAXA advisors. Their objectives include:
- Telemetry Analysis: Recovering and decoding as much flight data as possible from ground stations to reconstruct the final seconds of descent.
- Simulation Replays: Running high‐fidelity descent simulations incorporating possible sensor anomalies, propellant slosh, or attitude control irregularities that could cause a sudden altitude reading error.
- Software Audit: Verifying that the updated hazard‐avoidance algorithms and altitude‐fusion code behave as expected under rapid descent conditions.
- Hardware Inspection: Examining returned flight articles—such as any surviving components from the launch vehicle or adapter staging—to rule out mechanical impurities or adhesive proliferation that may have affected sensor performance.
ispace CEO Takeshi Hakamada is slated to hold a detailed press conference later today in Tokyo, where he will outline preliminary findings and announce a timeline for a third attempt. Preliminary indications suggest that Hakamada intends to leverage Firefly’s success and JAXA collaborations to increase the probability of success on Flight 3, currently targeted for late 2026.
International Reactions and Future Prospects
In Washington, NASA Administrator Bill Nelson congratulated Blue Ghost’s achievements and highlighted the collaborative spirit of commercial lunar ventures. “We celebrate Firefly’s success and will continue supporting all U.S. and international partners paving the way for sustainable lunar presence,” Nelson said. He did not comment directly on Resilience but emphasized NASA’s commitment to join the private sector in exploring the Moon.
In Europe, ESA Director General Josef Aschbacher called the commercial lunar lander landscape “an exciting new arena” and noted that “lessons learned from Resilience will be invaluable for our own missions, including the upcoming ‘Moonlight’ communication satellite launched by Bigelow Aerospace.”
The race to the Moon’s south pole—envisioned by NASA’s Artemis program—requires precise landing near permanently shadowed regions rich in water ice. ispace aims to position itself as a provider of cargo delivery for future crewed missions, potentially ferrying scientific payloads or fuel depots. Demonstrating reliable soft‐landings is essential to securing such contracts.
Academic Perspectives on Private Lunar Efforts
Dr. Sarah Johnson, Lunar Science professor at Caltech, remarks, “The rise of private lunar landers democratizes access to the Moon. Each attempt—successful or failed—advances our collective knowledge. Resilience’s failure highlights the unforgiving nature of lunar descent. Overcoming these challenges is a critical step in building a sustainable lunar economy.”
Lunar geologist Dr. Haruto Nakamura of the University of Tokyo adds, “Deploying multiple rovers and scientific instruments at diverse latitudes enriches our understanding of lunar geology and potential resource exploitation. While Resilience may not have completed its mission, its design and payload concepts remain compelling foundations for future missions.”
Conclusion: A Pivotal Moment for Commercial Space
Resilience’s likely crash in its attempted Moon landing underscores the technical hurdles that private space companies must surmount. As the third private lunar lander—Firefly’s Blue Ghost—succeeds and ispace perseveres through setbacks, the commercial lunar sector is entering a critical phase of maturation.
For ispace, failure is a temporary setback but also an opportunity to refine its technology, strengthen collaborations with JAXA and other international partners, and secure further financing. As the company’s CEO Takeshi Hakamada prepares for today’s press briefing, the space community awaits his roadmap for a third attempt—the next step on a journey that could transform lunar exploration from the realm of national agencies to a global commercial enterprise.
In the months ahead, Resilience’s final descent will be dissected frame by frame, its data parsed for every lesson. And on the Moon itself, Firefly’s Blue Ghost will continue transmitting geological data— a reminder that success and failure walk hand in hand on the path to the final frontier.
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