The Indian connection to this mission comes in the form of Sharad Bhaskaran, the mission director for Astrobotic. Bhaskaran, who has strong ties to India, will be responsible for commanding the touchdown of the Peregrine lander on February 23 in the moon’s Bay of Stickiness. The plan is for the lander to touch down shortly after sunrise and carry out its mission for 192 hours.
Bhaskaran, quoted as saying, “As mission director of Astrobotic technology, my job is to lead the engineering team in the development and a commercial robotic lunar lander capable of delivering payloads to the moon.” Born just three years before Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin’s historic moonwalk in 1969, Bhaskaran developed a passion for space exploration through his love for Star Trek and science fiction literature.
This will be the second private lunar mission following Israel’s Space IL’s attempt in April 2019, which was not fully successful. As part of the Peregrine lander’s payload, messages from children worldwide will be included in the “Pocari Sweat Lunar Dream Time Capsule” from Japan. The piece of Mount Everest is part of a German payload called DHL Moonbox, which will also contain photographs, novels, and works by students as personal mementos on the lunar surface. Other payloads include a physical coin loaded with one Bitcoin from Seychelles and the first Latin American scientific instrument from the Mexican Space Agency.
This private lunar mission stands out for several reasons. It will be the first US lunar landing since Nasa’s Apollo 17 mission over 50 years ago, marking a significant milestone. It is also the first mission to launch under Nasa’s Commercial Lunar Payload Services Initiative. The Peregrine lander will be carried by United Launch Alliance’s (ULA) Vulcan Centaur rocket, which will be its inaugural flight.