A Japanese mission will launch the first house on the moon this winter, aboard a lunar rover called TENACIOUS. The spacecraft will travel to the Moon with a lunar landing probe called RESILIANCE, built by Japan’s private space company ispace.
The representatives of the Moonhouse project communicated the news on an online social network. “Finally we are proud to announce that there will be a . It will be launched from Cape Canaveral in the winter of 2024 secured aboard the TENACIOUS lunar rover stored in the RESILIANCE selenization probe built by the private Japanese space company ispace. Unreal,” Moonhouse representatives wrote.
is a project by the Swedish artist Mikael Genberg, started 25 years ago, which aims to send a red box to the surface of the moon. Genberg is known for his spectacular artistic projects. One of the most notable projects is The Moonhouse, which has attracted international attention.
The rover will conduct several exploration operations on the Moon
The tenacious lunar rover (in translation tenacious or persevering) will be brought down to the surface of the Moon by the Resilience probe (in translation resilient or resistance). The rover will then conduct several exploration operations using a high-resolution camera designed to capture images of the lunar surface. Tenacious will communicate and receive commands from Earth via the probe.
The vehicle is compact, he reports, measuring only 26 centimeters high and 21.26 centimeters long. The rover weighs around 5 kilograms, so it is similar to the micro-rover sent by China to the far side of the moon with the Chang’e 6 mission.
The Resilience probe will also deliver commercial and scientific equipment to the lunar surface, so the mission will contribute to NASA’s Artemis program, they said.
“Tenacious perfectly captures the spirit of this little rover”
“Tenacious perfectly captures the spirit of this little rover. It is built in Europe and will be the first to transport European customers to the surface of the Moon and collect space resources under the Luxembourg Space Resources Law 2017,” explained Julien Lamamy, executive director of the European branch for ispace.
The two spacecraft will be launched aboard a Falcon 9 from Cape Canaveral, Florida, USA, in December 2024. The mission will be ispace’s second attempt to perform a light moon landing. The first attempt took place in April 2023, but failed.
