Intuitive machines: Lunar Ulysses sends a selfie with Earth in the background

Just hours after launching from Cape Canaveral, Florida, last Thursday, US company Intuitive Machines' Odysseus robotic lander sent back a series of selfies against Earth.

In one of the images (above) published by the company, it appears that the vehicle's landing legs are touching the Earth.

It would take Odysseus one week to reach the moon.

On February 22, it will attempt to land at Malabert A crater near the South Pole, where large amounts of ice have been discovered, a valuable natural resource for future human colonies, where water can be broken down by electrolysis to produce oxygen and hydrogen. , which can be used as fuel.

If the mission succeeds, it will be the first American controlled landing on the moon since the last Apollo mission in 1972.

This will also be the first time a private company has set foot on the moon.

The Intuitive Machines mission is carried out as part of the CLPS program (NASA's Commercial Lunar Payload Services Program, which provides for the transportation of service equipment by commercial vehicles).

The six scientific instruments carried by Odysseus will examine conditions at the Moon's south pole, ahead of the first manned mission in 2026, as part of the Artemis programme.

Last week's launch of Odysseus came a month after the loss of another private US company, Astrobotic Technology's lunar module, which suffered a leak in its propulsion system shortly after its January 8 launch.

This was the third failed attempt by a private company to land on the moon, after the failure of two previous missions by Israel and Japan.

Intuitive Machines' next mission is scheduled to land on the moon at the South Pole in 2024. A third mission will follow later that year, carrying a series of small robots.

Last month, Japan became the fifth country to land a spacecraft on the moon, after India's success in 2023.

The United States and Russia are the only other countries to do so. In 2019, China became the first country to achieve a controlled landing on the far side of the moon.