Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter captured this image of Intuitive Machine’s Odysseus Lander on the Moon.
On Feb. 22, Intuitive Machines’ Nova-C lander, called Odysseus, completed a seven-day journey to lunar orbit and softly landed near crater Malapert A in the South Pole region of the Moon at 6:24 p.m. EST. On Feb. 24, NASA’s Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) spacecraft passed over the landing site at an altitude of about 56 miles (90 km) and photographed Odysseus.
Odysseus came to rest at 80.13 degrees south latitude, 1.44 degrees east longitude, 8,461 feet (2,579 meters) elevation, within a degraded one-kilometer diameter crater where the local terrain is sloped at 12 degrees.
Odysseus marks the first successful soft landing of NASA’s CLPS (Commercial Lunar Payload Services) initiative and the first time that new NASA science instruments and technology demonstrations are operating on the Moon in more than 50 years.