Houston-based space company Intuitive Machines' Athena lunar lander approached its final landing spot on the Moon early Thursday morning, where it was meant to touch down autonomously near Mons Mouton, a flat-topped mountain roughly 100 miles from the south pole, at around 12:30 pm EST.

But several hours later, its exact fate remains unknown. While mission control confirmed it had reached the Moon and was generating at least some solar power, pretty much everything else was sounding about as ambiguous as possible.

Then, Intuitive Machines CEO Steve Altemus made a somber announcement at a press conference.

"We don't believe we're in the correct attitude on the surface of the Moon yet again," he said. "I don't have all the data yet to say exactly what the attitude of the vehicle is. We're collecting photos now and downlinking those. And we're going to get a picture of [NASA's] Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter camera from above and we'll confirm that over the coming days."

Altemus was referring to Athena's predecessor, a spacecraft called Odyssey, which ran into serious trouble during its landing attempt last year, falling over after tripping on a rock.

As a result, the lander had to be shut down after it failed to generate sufficient solar power.

Japan's Smart Lander for Investigating Moon (SLIM) suffered a similar fate after landing on its nose in January 2024.

And it's not looking great for Athena, either. Earlier this afternoon, Altemus revealed that the company was working to save power, as CNN reports, since it wasn't generating enough on its own.

"We’re looking at things now to determine exactly where we stand," he told employees at a watch party.

"The main priority right now is to get a picture of our orientation and location on the surface so that we know precisely how to move forward with the mission," Altemus added. "Where is the vehicle? What’s it look like? Where can we point the antennas? What can we do with the radios? What can we do with the science panels? I don’t know yet."

But there may be a silver lining. Athena was meant to deploy a suitcase-sized rover developed by another space startup, called Lunar Outpost.

"If it’s on its side again — which again, hopefully doesn’t happen — we can deploy if it’s on its side, kind of leaning down," Lunar Outpost CEO Justin Cyrus told CNN. "We (can) try to drive off and just see what happens again."

It's an especially busy time for lunar traffic. Over the weekend, Texas-based startup Firefly Aerospace's Blue Ghost successfully touched down on the lunar surface without incident. Japanese space company ispace's Hakuto-R Mission 2 is also en route, and is expected to attempt a landing on the far side of the Moon later this spring.

Intuitive Machines will be hosting a news conference at 4 pm EST. We'll update this space when we hear more.

Updated with comment from Intuitive Machines CEO Steve Altemus.

More on lunar landers: American Spacecraft Touches Down on Moon, Sends Back Photos


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