Japan's first-ever spacecraft destined for the moon will attempt its third launch, hoping the third time is the charm.
ispace Inc.'s HAKUTO-R mission is due for launch from Cape Canaveral, Florida, at 2:38 a.m. (7:38 a.m. GMT) after two delays caused by inspections of its SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket.
The national space agencies of the United States, Russia and China have achieved soft landings on Earth's nearest neighbor in the past half century but no companies have.
Mission success would also be a milestone in space cooperation between Japan and the United States when China is becoming increasingly competitive and rides on Russian rockets are no longer available in the wake of Russia's invasion of Ukraine.
It would also cap a space-filled few days for Japan, after billionaire Yusaku Maezawa revealed on Friday the eight crew members he hopes to take on a SpaceX flyby of the moon as soon as next year. Among them K-pop star TOP and DJ Steve Aoki will be among the eight crew members he plans to take on a trip around the moon, hitching a ride on one of Elon Musk's SpaceX rockets.
The name HAKUTO refers to the white rabbit that lives on the moon in Japanese folklore, in contrast to the Western idea of the man on the moon. The project was a finalist in the Google Lunar XPRIZE before being revived as a commercial venture.
Next year is the Year of the Rabbit in the Asian calendar. The craft, assembled in Germany, is expected to land on the moon in late April.
The company hopes this will be the first of many deliveries of government and commercial payloads. The ispace craft aims to put a small NASA satellite into lunar orbit to search for water deposits before touching down in the Atlas Crater.
The M1 lander will deploy two robotic rovers, a two-wheeled, baseball-sized device from Japan's JAXA space agency and the four-wheeled Rashid explorer made by the UAE. It will also carry an experimental solid-state battery made by NGK Spark Plug Co.
Privately funded ispace has a contract with NASA to ferry payloads to the moon from 2025 and is aiming to build a permanently staffed lunar colony by 2040.