The Odyssey flight was not only the first American mission to the surface of the moon after a hiatus of more than 51 years. It is also the first time a commercial entity has landed on another space body. After several unsuccessful attempts by other companies, the latest of which – Astrobotic Technology’s Peregrine mission – took place in early January, Intuitive Machines was the first to succeed, albeit in close cooperation with NASA.
The US space agency acts as a customer here. It appears to have bought well: it paid $118 million to develop the Nova-C class IM-1 spacecraft, as Odysseus is officially called. When similar projects are done by NASA alone, the costs are several times higher.
Intuitive Machines is based in Houston, the unofficial capital of the US space program. The main personality of the company is Kam Ghaffarian, an American of Iranian origin, who originally worked on contracts for NASA at Lockheed Martin. Together with him, Stephen Altemus and Timothy Crain founded the company. Both previously held senior management positions at NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston, so they’ve come through the proverbial
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2024-02-23 14:51:20
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