Private U.S. craft lands on moon, but tips over, limiting communication

Dan Harrison, a designer for Intuitive Machines, cheers with colleagues during a watch party in Houston moments after their Odysseus lander arrived on the moon. A private U.S. lunar lander tipped over at touchdown and ended up on its side near the moon’s south pole, hampering communications, company officials said Friday. With Thursday’s touchdown, Intuitive Machines became the first private business to pull off a moon landing, a feat previously achieved by only five countries’ space agencies. Launched last week from Florida, Odysseus took an extra lap around the moon Thursday to allow time for the last-minute switch to NASA’s laser system, which saved the day, officials noted. Until Thursday, the U.S. had not landed on the moon since Apollo 17’s Gene Cernan and Harrison Schmitt closed out NASA’s famed moon-landing program in December 1972.