By Jatan Mehta | The world’s only newsletter dedicated to covering and contextualizing global lunar exploration updates, including plans to return humans this decade.
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Astrobotic launches its first spacecraft built to land on the Moon At 7:18 UTC today, January 8, Astrobotic’s Peregrine lunar lander blasted off to space onboard the inaugural flight of ULA’s Vulcan rocket, at long last marking the formal start of missions part of NASA’s CLPS
Chandrayaan
This is the last Moon Monday of 2023 as I take my year-end break to wind down an insanely busy year sprawling with conferences and talks over and above my canonical writing work. Alright, alright, I’m not done for the year just yet: expect a special story later this
Moon Monday
NASA researchers can now directly ask for access to China’s Chang’e 5 lunar samples In welcome news, NASA has secured an exception from the US Congress for its researchers to be able to apply for accessing lunar samples brought to Earth by China’s Chang’e 5 mission
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This is a half-yearly appreciation note, and an introduction for readers subscribed after April, that my Moon Monday newsletter is being supported by sponsor Epsilon3—for the third year in a row! Led by Laura and Max, Epsilon3 is a web-based platform to manage, streamline, and reduce risk in complex
Japan and Selene
Meet RESILIENCE, ispace Japan’s second Moon mission Following ispace Japan’s failed touchdown attempt on the Moon with the M1 mission in April, the company has improved the hardware and software design of the Hakuto-R lander for the M2 mission in late 2024, called “RESILIENCE” to reflect the spirited
Moon Monday
NASA gets serious about extracting oxygen on the Moon On November 6, NASA formally requested input from the US industry on how to go about (competitively) funding a Moon mission payload that will demonstrate extracting oxygen from lunar soil and rocks. Called Lunar Infrastructure Foundational Technologies (LIFT-1), NASA aims for
Japan and Selene
<This edition of Moon Monday was pre-scheduled on Sunday night IST to get published and delivered per usual on Monday since I’m tending to a family need.> I’m delighted to welcome space writer and author Gurbir Singh as an individual sponsor of both Moon Monday and
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If you’re reading this blog+newsletter, you’re likely in a position of privilege. Please consider donating for the affected innocent kids in the Hamas-Israel war. The Palestine Children’s Relief Fund is the option I’ve supported via since the non-political non-profit is providing basic necessities to children
Moon Monday
Today marks 150 weekly editions of archiving and contextualizing global developments in the exploration of our Moon. It’s satiating to work on and write the world’s only such resource. If you enjoy and appreciate my work to serve space communities worldwide, kindly consider sponsoring Moon Monday as an
Moon Monday
Two clarifications from Moon Monday #148: Most of the enhanced mobility I referred to provided by Axiom’s upcoming AxEMU spacesuits for crewed Artemis astronauts isn’t in contrast to NASA’s xEMU units but rather the current EMU suits in operation at the International Space Station. In fact, being
China and Luna
I’m in Delhi this week to attend the Indian Space Conclave. If you’re around, get in touch to chat space, science, writing, and the Web! Mission updates * JAXA’s SLIM lunar lander flew 5,000 kilometers past the Moon on October 4. Andrew Jones reports that SLIM’s
Moon Monday
Mission updates * CNSA announced on September 29 that China will indeed launch the Chang’e 6 farside sample return spacecraft and its supporting orbiter next year. * Following two maneuvers last month to raise the SLIM lunar lander’s Earthbound orbit, JAXA fired the spacecraft’s engines on October 1 to
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