Touchdown! Odysseus Lands on the Moon

By Max Levy

On February 22, 2024, the Odysseus lander touched the surface of the moon just seven days after its launch. The lander was crafted through a joint partnership between NASA and Intuitive Machines and successfully landed on the south polar region of the moon. The lander was a pioneer in the field of space exploration, as it was the first successful “soft-landing” of a commercial vehicle on the moon. The purpose of the lander is to collect data and report back to Earth about its findings. It has been successful in all of these fronts, as it has collected a significant amount of crucial data and information. 

In addition, the lander brought with it “six payloads” from NASA that will be used to prepare the lunar surface for human investigation and study. With this, the lander will be crucial to NASA’s future Artemis missions that hope to send more Americans to the moon in the upcoming years. The landing, the first of its kind since the end of the Apollo program, has proved to the world stage that America is back and ready to explore the moon, the cosmos, and the beyond.