Odysseus moon lander tipped over on its side during historic mission. How did that happen?

Odysseus, the first U.S.-built spacecraft to land on the moon since 1972, got tripped up just before touchdown and now rests horizontally on its side on the lunar surface.

Steve Altemus, CEO of the Houston-based company Intuitive Machines that build the lander, said the team initially thought the unmanned six-footed lander had reached the surface upright. But data being sent from Odysseus revealed its horizontal resting situation.

Did moon lander Odysseus tip over?

As the lander was descending vertically and laterally, it likely "caught a foot in the surface and the lander has tipped," he said during a video news conference on Friday, holding a model of Odysseus resting a few degrees above horizontal.

Lunar lander Odysseus:Spacecraft tipped over and landed on its side on the moon's surface. What happens now?

Is Odysseus on its side?

Evidence suggesting the lander is not fully horizontal comes from the amount of power the lander's solar array is generating, Altemus said.

That suggests Odysseus is "somewhat elevated off the surface horizontally," he said. "So that's why we think it's on a rock or the foot is in a crevasse or something … to hold it in that attitude."

At this point, Odysseus has "quite a bit of operational capability, even though we're tipped over," Altemus said. The lander was approaching the surface faster than the team had hoped and may have possibly fractured one of the legs of its landing gear as it "tipped over gently," he said.

Intuitive Machines hopes to get some photos in the next few days to see "exactly what the material is that's underneath the lander," said Tim Crain, the company's co-founder and chief technology officer.

The company posted the first image from Odysseus on Friday on X, formerly Twitter. The craft will continue to collect data for NASA as the agency prepares to send astronauts back to the lunar surface for its Artemis program for the first time since the last Apollo mission 52 years ago.

Why did Odysseus not land upright?

Totally successful unmanned lunar landings are not a slam dunk. Only five countries – the U.S., the U.S.S.R., China, India and Japan – have successfully landed a spacecraft on the moon.

A Japanese spacecraft landed on the moon in January, but when it hit the surface it was nearly upside down. In an earlier attempt in April 2023, a lander designed by a Japanese company crashed into the moon's surface.

Intuitive Machines became the first private business to pull off a moon landing. Last month, another U.S. company, Astrobotic Technology, had an unsuccessful attempt when its lunar lander developed a fuel leak. The crippled lander burned up in the atmosphere over the Pacific, along with the remains and DNA of more than 70 deceased people on board for a lunar burial.

"Sending a spacecraft to the Moon is not easy," Nicky Fox, a rocket scientist and NASA science administrator, said on X, at the time soon after the fuel leak was discovered.

In August 2023, the Russian Luna-25 probe also crashed onto the surface of the moon.

Contributing: Eric Lagatta, Claire Thornton and The Associated Press.

Follow Mike Snider on X and Threads: @mikesnider & mikegsnider.

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