Beresheet: first privately funded lunar mission
Beresheet: primera misión lunar financiada por privados
- Date
- 11 de abril de 2019 · confidence high
- Place
- Yehud, Central District, Israel
- Credited to
- SpaceIL and Israel Aerospace Industries (IAI)
- Field
- Movement
⚠️ Disputed: the sources disagree.
What was discovered
A 585 kg lander built by the nonprofit SpaceIL, launched on a Falcon 9, which entered lunar orbit and crashed when its main engine failed during descent. It was the fourth country to attempt a controlled lunar landing with its own craft and the first privately funded lunar mission.
'Landing' is inexact: it crashed, but it achieved lunar orbit and the preceding phase. The Google Lunar X Prize (2007) inspired it and ended without a winner. Japan's Hakuto-R lander (2023) also crashed.
What it led to
- Beresheet 2, a SpaceIL project with IAI
- a model for commercial lunar missions (NASA's CLPS)
- Israel's capacity for small space probes