- Kaur leads India to victory over Pakistan in Women's T20 World Cup
- Juventus held by Cagliari after late penalty drama
- In France's Marseille, teen 'stabbed 50 times' then burned alive
- Ruthless Gauff beats Muchova in straight sets to win China Open
- India restrict Pakistan to 105-8 in Women's T20 World Cup
- England target repeat of Pakistan Test whitewash
- Penrith Panthers win fourth straight NRL title after downing Storm
- Weary Sinner happy for day off after battling into Shanghai last 16
- Pakistan's Masood warns England still a force without Stokes
- Madrid's Carvajal to miss several months after serious knee injury
- Israel pounds Lebanon ahead of Hamas attack anniversary
- Two elephants die in flash flooding in northern Thailand
- Sabalenka targets world number one and Wuhan hat-trick
- Toddler among 4 dead in migrant Channel crossings
- Tunisia votes with Saied set for re-election
- Bagnaia sets 'example' with Japan MotoGP win to cut gap on Martin
- Intense Israeli bombing rocks Beirut ahead of war anniversary
- Mozambique vote: no suspense but some disillusion
- Austrian rapper channels anti-racist rage in Romani hip-hop songs
- Ohtani magic powers Dodgers over Padres in MLB playoff thriller
- Five of the best: Pakistan-England Test thrillers
- Man sets arm on fire as marches across US mark Gaza war anniversary
- Vietnam's young coffee entrepreneurs brew up a revolution
- Trump rallies at site of failed assassination: 'Never quit'
- Too hot by day, Dubai's floodlit beaches are packed at night
- Is music finally reckoning with #MeToo?
- Fans hail Trump's 'guts' as he returns to site of rally shooting
- Lebanon state media says 'very violent' Israeli strikes hit south Beirut
- Guardians maul Tigers, miracle Mets rally in MLB series openers
- Lebanon state media says Israeli strikes hit south Beirut
- Miami on track for MLS record points after win in Toronto
- Madrid beat Villarreal but Carvajal suffers knee injury
- Madrid beat Villarreal to move level with Liga leaders Barcelona
- Monaco take top spot in Ligue 1 with win at Rennes
- French rugby player on rape charge whistled but 'serene' on return
- Madrid beat Villarreal to level Liga leaders Barca
- Thuram treble fires Inter past Torino and up to second
- 'Fight': defiant Trump jets in to site of rally shooting
- Toddler among 3 dead in migrant Channel crossings
- Mexico City's new mayor sworn in with pledges on water, housing
- Israel on alert ahead of Hamas attack anniversary
- Guardians maul Tigers in MLB playoff series opener
- Macron criticises Israel on Gaza, Lebanon operations
- French rugby player whistled but 'serene' on return amid ongoing rape case
- Kovacic stars as Man City sink Fulham to get title bid back on track
- Retegui hat-trick fires five-star Atalanta to hammering of Genoa
- Heavyweights Australia, England off to World Cup winning starts
- Visiting UN refugee agency chief decries 'terrible crisis' in Lebanon
- Spinners come to party as England defeat Bangladesh at T20 World Cup
- Search continues for missing in deadly Bosnia floods
Private US spaceship takes off for the Moon
A US spaceship attempting a lunar landing lifted off early Thursday from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida, the second such private-led effort this year after the first ended in failure.
Intuitive Machines, the Houston company leading mission "IM-1," hopes to become the first non-government entity to achieve a soft touchdown on the Moon, and to land the first US robot on the surface since the Apollo missions more than five decades ago.
Its hexagonal-shaped Nova-C lander named "Odysseus" blasted off on top of a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket at 01:06 am Thursday local time (0606 GMT).
IM-1 was supposed to blast off on Wednesday, but the launch was postponed after SpaceX discovered abnormal temperatures as it attempted to fuel up the lander.
The lander has a new type of supercooled liquid methane and oxygen engine giving it the power to reach its destination quickly, avoiding prolonged exposure to a region of high radiation surrounding the Earth known as the Van Allen belt.
Intuitive Machine's Trent Martin told reporters this week that the "opportunity to return the United States to the Moon for the first time since 1972 is a feat of engineering that demands a hunger to explore."
Despite the postponement, the craft is still due to reach its landing site Malapert A on February 22, an impact crater 300 kilometers (180 miles) from the south pole.
NASA hopes to eventually build a long-term presence and harvest ice there for both drinking water and rocket fuel under Artemis, its flagship Moon-to-Mars program.
NASA paid Intuitive Machines $118 million to ship science hardware to better understand and mitigate environmental risks for astronauts, the first of whom are scheduled to land no sooner than 2026.
There is more colorful cargo aboard as well, including a digital archive of human knowledge and 125 mini-sculptures of the Moon by the artist Jeff Koons.
After touchdown, the payloads are expected to run for roughly seven days before lunar night sets in on the south pole, rendering Odysseus inoperable.
IM-1 is the second mission under a NASA initiative called Commercial Lunar Payload Services (CLPS), which the space agency created to delegate cargo services to the private sector to achieve savings and to stimulate a wider lunar economy.
The first, by Pittsburgh-based Astrobotic, launched in January, but its Peregrine spacecraft experienced an engine anomaly that caused a fuel leak and it was eventually brought back to burn up in Earth's atmosphere.
Soft landing a robot on the Moon is challenging because it has to navigate treacherous terrain amid a lag of several seconds in communications with Earth, and use its thrusters for a controlled descent in the absence of an atmosphere that would support parachutes.
Apart from Astrobotic's failed attempt, two other private initiatives got close: Beresheet, operated by an Israeli nonprofit, crash-landed in 2019; while Japanese company ispace also had a "hard landing" last year.
Only five nations have succeeded: the Soviet Union was first, then the United States, which is still the only country to also put people on the surface.
In the United States's long absence, China has landed three times since 2013, India in 2023, and Japan was the latest, last month -- though its robot has struggled to stay powered on after a wonky touchdown left its solar panels pointing the wrong way.
Intuitive Machines has two additional launches scheduled for this year, while another Texas company, Firefly Aerospace has one too. Astrobotic will get another shot in late 2024, carrying a NASA rover to the Moon's south pole.
NASA is increasingly purchasing services rather than hardware from commercial partners, unlike during the Cold War when it had a nearly unlimited budget and dictated contracts down to the last bolt.
G.Stevens--AMWN