Facts about Mars

The launch of the first private lander to the Moon, which was being carried out by the Japanese company ispace, by SpaceX was delayed on Wednesday.

Originally set to launch from Cape Canaveral in the US state of Florida at 3:37 a.m. (0837 GMT) on Thursday, a Falcon 9 rocket was delayed, according to SpaceX.

We're cancelling tomorrow's launch of @ispace inc's HAKUTO-R Mission 1 due to more launch vehicle inspections and data evaluation, the company tweeted.

Once a new target launch date is set, it will be announced.

Only the United States, Russia, and China have been able to successfully land a robot on the moon up until this point.

The Hakuto-R program's first mission is the one carried out by iSpace.

According to a statement from the corporation, the lander would arrive in the Atlas crater on the visible side of the Moon around April 2023.

SpaceX and ispace announced on Wednesday that the launch had already been delayed by a day because more pre-flight inspections were required.

The lander, which measures just over 2 by 2.5 metres, is equipped with a 10-kilogram rover named Rashid that was created by the United Arab Emirates.

Despite being a relative newbie to the space race, the oil-rich nation has had recent achievements, including last year's launch of a spacecraft into Mars' orbit. Rashid will be the first Moon mission for the Arab world if it is successful.

Takeshi Hakamada, CEO of ispace, stated, "We have accomplished so much in the six short years since we initially began conceiving this initiative in 2016."

Hakuto was one of five finalists in the global Google Lunar XPrize competition, which failed to produce a victor. The competition's goal was to send a rover to the Moon by the year 2018 deadline. However, a few of the projects are still in progress.

Another candidate, from the Israeli group SpaceIL, crashed into the ground while attempting to land and was unable to succeed in becoming the first privately-funded mission to accomplish the feat in April 2019.

By offering frequent, affordable transportation to the Moon, ispace, which only has 200 employees, "aims to extend the scope of human life into space and establish a sustainable world."

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