5 ms·

Kind of passed over in the discussion of the science and toppling - but did they give any idea why it landed 250 miles from its intended landing site? Seems li

Kind of passed over in the discussion of the science and toppling - but did they give any idea why it landed 250 miles from its intended landing site? Seems like a really large error?

aylmao 2y ago
Really funny spin from their PR department too: > “the most southernmost lunar landing and surface operations ever achieved”. > “This area has been avoided due to its rugged terrain and Intuitive Machines believes the insights and achievements from IM-2 will open this region for further space exploration.” I wonder if this 250 mile error is why they ended so far south in the first place.
- hcrisp 2y ago
  As I recall, Apollo 11 was off by 4 miles downrange, which was considered good but not precise. More work on the guidance / navigation system allowed for a precision landing in Apollo 12 (to touch down near a Surveyor probe).
  - sho_hn 2y ago
    If you want to read about this in fascinating detail, I highly recommend the book "Digital Apollo" by David A. Mindell. David's book spends a lot of time dwelling on the tension between highly automated systems and the role of the human in them, and the HCI factors of the Apollo missions. They also recap each landing through that lens, including the major changes done to the Lunar Module UI (physical + software) and the landing script/programs for each mission and how things worked out in practice and how it was debriefed after. If you want the insight look at the decision to go for precision landing, how (and how well) it was achieved and how everyone involved felt about it, this is probably your best one-stop go-to. And for anyone working in embedded UI, or around automation, etc. it's a wondeful mind-sharpener with many lessons in an inspiring applied context. The Apollo user interface and computer were so state of the art that many of the problems and solutions remain quite similar today. I work in a similar area (cars, with ever-increasing amounts of automation, driver assistance and connectivity) and some of the debates and on-the-job exchanges and meeting notes cited in the book could be straight out of my day job 60 years later with only minute differences. Some of the "Lessons on Software Development"-type docs penned by Apollo engineers in the aftermath of the program (trade-offs of platform approaches and HW abstractions vs. optimization, how to get a handle on quality and testing, etc.) also still read absolutely modern to this day, almost with greater summarizing clarity than what decades of paradigms and jargon have slathered on top.
    - ForOldHack 2y ago
      Thanks for that recommendation. Mendell's other book is not as exciting but they both are the pinnicle of historic technical writing, and yes, this is a sharepining tool for UI, enough to make it required reading. Of course his interactions with the Apollo engineers is priceless. I worked for one such engineer, and the strain of perfection was great discipline.
- Retric 2y ago
  It’s 250m which isn’t bad and suggests they intended it to be the southern most probe.
olex 2y ago
According to IM's website, it landed within 250 _meters_ of the intended site - could there be a unit confusion (m / mi) somewhere in the press chain? https://www.intuitivemachines.com/im-2 https://www.intuitivemachines.com/im-2
- sho_hn 2y ago
  250 meters is very respectable for a first try. Apollo 14 and 12 achieved 30 meters and 163 meters with human piloting, respectively, and that's after the program made precision landing a high-effort mission goal. The automated missions of the 60s-70s were often off target by a kilometre or more, but Surveyor 3 came in within 200 meters as well in '67. Japan did a mission in 2024 with the express purpose of achieving automated precision landing - SLIM, nicknamed "Moon Sniper" - and hit 55 meters off center of a 100-by-100 elipse despite losing a main engine nozzle during descent (but also landed on its side, bummer). 50-150 meters is what the Chinese missions in the 2010s generally managed to do at times as well. I think Chang'e 5 (2020) holds the present record at within 10 meters.
  - mmooss 2y ago
    Is 50 year old technology and expertise a good standard for comparison for modern tech?
    - macintux 2y ago
      I'd say relative to the difficulty of accuracy, the hostility of the environment, the known "lumpiness" of the moon, and the challenges of testing any of it in advance...yes?
    - MadnessASAP 2y ago
      Well when I was a child I tried to land on the moon but missed by about 384,000 km. That was only about 30 years ago, so their doing a heck of a lot better then that which is something!
      - 2y ago
kccqzy 2y ago
250 miles? The mission official website of Intuitive Machines says 250 meters. From https://www.intuitivemachines.com/im-2 https://www.intuitivemachines.com/im-2 > HOUSTON, TX – March 7, 2025 – Intuitive Machines, Inc. (Nasdaq: LUNR, LUNRW) (“Intuitive Machines”) (“Company”), a leading space exploration, infrastructure, and services company, has announced the IM-2 mission lunar lander, Athena, landed 250 meters from its intended landing site in the Mons Mouton region of the lunar south pole, inside of a crater. It's also somewhat funny that this mission update is written in the style of a press releases, mentioning that stock ticker and an obligatory paragraph about forward-looking statements, whereas others are just a normal update.
- Oarch 2y ago
  There's a long history of typos behind the paper's nickname Grauniad
  - jimnotgym 2y ago
    And an interesting history too. The paper used to be printed in Manchester. The London papers made errors too, but corrected them in their second edition. There was no second edition of the Guardian due to the time it took to get it to London
    - Oarch 2y ago
      Placing movable type and perfecting layouts could be quite a cathartic and engrossing game...
      - ForOldHack 2y ago
        I have honestly never heard of movable type on the web or is it all movable, rather than carthartic it's confusing.
        dredmorbius 2y ago
        Well, <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Movable_Type https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Movable_Type>
colechristensen 2y ago
> Seems like a really large error? At one point during its transit the spacecraft will have been going about 23,000 miles per hour, suddenly 250 miles doesn't seem like much. Though obviously that's in the middle of the trip and plenty of things happen between the transit between the earth and moon and landing.
- vpribish 2y ago
  goddamn. it was 250 METERS - not miles.
  - TheOtherHobbes 2y ago
    Can we just remind ourselves that launching a probe from the Earth and landing it within 250m of a target on THE MOON is incredible engineering? I know it's taken for granted, but it really shouldn't be.
    - vpribish 2y ago
      Yes, you have my permission to remind people of that - especially the poster I was responding to. The accuracy of the landing was excellent.
    - KennyBlanken 2y ago
      You can drive over 500 miles and accurately park your car in your relative's driveway within less than a foot. In both cases there are references along the way and at the destination. With no atmosphere landing on the moon seems rather trivia for today's technology?
dredmorbius 2y ago
FYI, The Gruaniad has since corrected its error in TFA.

Kind of passed over in the discussion of the science and toppling - but did they give any idea why it landed 250 miles from its intended landing site? Seems like a really large error?

aylmao 2y ago

Really funny spin from their PR department too: > “the most southernmost lunar landing and surface operations ever achieved”. > “This area has been avoided due to its rugged terrain and Intuitive Machines believes the insights and achievements from IM-2 will open this region for further space exploration.” I wonder if this 250 mile error is why they ended so far south in the first place.

hcrisp 2y ago
As I recall, Apollo 11 was off by 4 miles downrange, which was considered good but not precise. More work on the guidance / navigation system allowed for a precision landing in Apollo 12 (to touch down near a Surveyor probe).
- sho_hn 2y ago
  If you want to read about this in fascinating detail, I highly recommend the book "Digital Apollo" by David A. Mindell. David's book spends a lot of time dwelling on the tension between highly automated systems and the role of the human in them, and the HCI factors of the Apollo missions. They also recap each landing through that lens, including the major changes done to the Lunar Module UI (physical + software) and the landing script/programs for each mission and how things worked out in practice and how it was debriefed after. If you want the insight look at the decision to go for precision landing, how (and how well) it was achieved and how everyone involved felt about it, this is probably your best one-stop go-to. And for anyone working in embedded UI, or around automation, etc. it's a wondeful mind-sharpener with many lessons in an inspiring applied context. The Apollo user interface and computer were so state of the art that many of the problems and solutions remain quite similar today. I work in a similar area (cars, with ever-increasing amounts of automation, driver assistance and connectivity) and some of the debates and on-the-job exchanges and meeting notes cited in the book could be straight out of my day job 60 years later with only minute differences. Some of the "Lessons on Software Development"-type docs penned by Apollo engineers in the aftermath of the program (trade-offs of platform approaches and HW abstractions vs. optimization, how to get a handle on quality and testing, etc.) also still read absolutely modern to this day, almost with greater summarizing clarity than what decades of paradigms and jargon have slathered on top.
  - ForOldHack 2y ago
    Thanks for that recommendation. Mendell's other book is not as exciting but they both are the pinnicle of historic technical writing, and yes, this is a sharepining tool for UI, enough to make it required reading. Of course his interactions with the Apollo engineers is priceless. I worked for one such engineer, and the strain of perfection was great discipline.
Retric 2y ago
It’s 250m which isn’t bad and suggests they intended it to be the southern most probe.

olex 2y ago

According to IM's website, it landed within 250 _meters_ of the intended site - could there be a unit confusion (m / mi) somewhere in the press chain? https://www.intuitivemachines.com/im-2 https://www.intuitivemachines.com/im-2

sho_hn 2y ago
250 meters is very respectable for a first try. Apollo 14 and 12 achieved 30 meters and 163 meters with human piloting, respectively, and that's after the program made precision landing a high-effort mission goal. The automated missions of the 60s-70s were often off target by a kilometre or more, but Surveyor 3 came in within 200 meters as well in '67. Japan did a mission in 2024 with the express purpose of achieving automated precision landing - SLIM, nicknamed "Moon Sniper" - and hit 55 meters off center of a 100-by-100 elipse despite losing a main engine nozzle during descent (but also landed on its side, bummer). 50-150 meters is what the Chinese missions in the 2010s generally managed to do at times as well. I think Chang'e 5 (2020) holds the present record at within 10 meters.
- mmooss 2y ago
  Is 50 year old technology and expertise a good standard for comparison for modern tech?
  - macintux 2y ago
    I'd say relative to the difficulty of accuracy, the hostility of the environment, the known "lumpiness" of the moon, and the challenges of testing any of it in advance...yes?
  - MadnessASAP 2y ago
    Well when I was a child I tried to land on the moon but missed by about 384,000 km. That was only about 30 years ago, so their doing a heck of a lot better then that which is something!
    - 2y ago

kccqzy 2y ago

250 miles? The mission official website of Intuitive Machines says 250 meters. From https://www.intuitivemachines.com/im-2 https://www.intuitivemachines.com/im-2 > HOUSTON, TX – March 7, 2025 – Intuitive Machines, Inc. (Nasdaq: LUNR, LUNRW) (“Intuitive Machines”) (“Company”), a leading space exploration, infrastructure, and services company, has announced the IM-2 mission lunar lander, Athena, landed 250 meters from its intended landing site in the Mons Mouton region of the lunar south pole, inside of a crater. It's also somewhat funny that this mission update is written in the style of a press releases, mentioning that stock ticker and an obligatory paragraph about forward-looking statements, whereas others are just a normal update.

Oarch 2y ago
There's a long history of typos behind the paper's nickname Grauniad
- jimnotgym 2y ago
  And an interesting history too. The paper used to be printed in Manchester. The London papers made errors too, but corrected them in their second edition. There was no second edition of the Guardian due to the time it took to get it to London
  - Oarch 2y ago
    Placing movable type and perfecting layouts could be quite a cathartic and engrossing game...
    - ForOldHack 2y ago
      I have honestly never heard of movable type on the web or is it all movable, rather than carthartic it's confusing.
      - dredmorbius 2y ago
        Well, <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Movable_Type https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Movable_Type>

colechristensen 2y ago

> Seems like a really large error? At one point during its transit the spacecraft will have been going about 23,000 miles per hour, suddenly 250 miles doesn't seem like much. Though obviously that's in the middle of the trip and plenty of things happen between the transit between the earth and moon and landing.

vpribish 2y ago
goddamn. it was 250 METERS - not miles.
- TheOtherHobbes 2y ago
  Can we just remind ourselves that launching a probe from the Earth and landing it within 250m of a target on THE MOON is incredible engineering? I know it's taken for granted, but it really shouldn't be.
  - vpribish 2y ago
    Yes, you have my permission to remind people of that - especially the poster I was responding to. The accuracy of the landing was excellent.
  - KennyBlanken 2y ago
    You can drive over 500 miles and accurately park your car in your relative's driveway within less than a foot. In both cases there are references along the way and at the destination. With no atmosphere landing on the moon seems rather trivia for today's technology?

dredmorbius 2y ago

FYI, The Gruaniad has since corrected its error in TFA.