The Houston-based company Intuitive Machines has announced the intended touchdown site for its Nova-C lunar lander. The IM-1 mission is due to launch on a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket in October 2021. It will land near Vallis Schröteri, a collapsed lava tunnel in the Oceanus Procellarum (Ocean of Storms) region of the moon. This is a site that was initially considered by Nasa in the late 1960s/early 70s for its subsequently cancelled Apollo 18 mission.
The Nova-C will deliver commercial cargo and five Nasa-provided payloads to the lunar surface. It can carry 100kg of payload and generate 200 watts of power. It will also test a precision landing and hazard avoidance (PLHA) landing system, created by Intuitive Machines, that aims to be able to land within 200 metres of a designated spot.
Together with two other companies, Astrobotic and Orbit Beyond Inc, Intuitive Machines shared a $250m contract in May 2019 to deliver Nasa payloads to the moon as part of Nasa’s Commercial Lunar Payload Services (CLPS) programme. By July that year, however, Orbit Beyond had dropped out. Astrobotic’s Mission One will use a United Launch Alliance Vulcan Centaur rocket and is also scheduled to launch in 2021.
