BRAKE FAILURE: ISRAELI LUNAR MISSION ENDS IN A NAIL BITING MISS
Beresheet, Israel’s lunar lander travelled 5.5 million kilometers to and orbited the moon. It descended within 15km of the Moon’s surface but its engine failed to execute its very last set of instructions which was to retro-fire just before landing to act as brakes. The failure meant that the much publicised moon landing ended in a heap twisted metals after crashing onto the surface of the moon just a few hours ago.
It was a moment of sadness for the tiny nation as most Israeli kept a vigil for the feat that would have made Israel the fourth nation to achieve a soft landing on the moon. Now they are fifth to achieve a crash landing following India, China, USA and Russia, in that order.
The $100 million mission was a low budget undertaking and it was why it took so long (seven weeks instead of a few days or even a few hours). Instead of burning expensive fuel and using a heavy rocket, mission navigators chose to cut costs by swinging the spacecraft round and round the earth and then throw it outwards with impulse engine firing, using the earth as a gravity sling. “If you tried it and you fail, you go and try again”, says Benjamin Netanyahu, newly elected Israeli Prime Minister.