A NASA spacecraft around the moon has photographed the crash site of a Japanese company’s lunar lander.Related video above: SpaceX rocket being tested in Texas explodesNASA released the pictures Friday, two weeks after Ispace’s lander slammed into the moon.The images show a dark smudge where the lander, named Resilience, and its mini rover crashed into the Mare Frigoris, or Sea of Cold, a volcanic region in the moon’s far north. A faint halo around the area was formed by the lunar dirt kicked up by the impact.NASA’s Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter captured the scene last week.The crash was the second failure in two years for Tokyo-based Ispace. Company officials plan to hold a news conference next week to explain what doomed the latest mission, launched from Cape Canaveral in January.___The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Department of Science Education and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. The AP is solely responsible for all content.
CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (AP) —
A NASA spacecraft around the moon has photographed the crash site of a Japanese company’s lunar lander.
Related video above: SpaceX rocket being tested in Texas explodes
NASA released the pictures Friday, two weeks after Ispace’s lander slammed into the moon.
The images show a dark smudge where the lander, named Resilience, and its mini rover crashed into the Mare Frigoris, or Sea of Cold, a volcanic region in the moon’s far north. A faint halo around the area was formed by the lunar dirt kicked up by the impact.
NASA/Goddard/Arizona State University via AP
This image provided by NASA shows an annotation indicating the impact site for ispace’s Resilience lunar lander, seen by the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter Camera on June 11, 2025.
NASA’s Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter captured the scene last week.
The crash was the second failure in two years for Tokyo-based Ispace. Company officials plan to hold a news conference next week to explain what doomed the latest mission, launched from Cape Canaveral in January.
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The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Department of Science Education and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. The AP is solely responsible for all content.