MOREHEAD, Ky. (LEX 18) — Morehead State University's Space Science department played a crucial role in the first landing of an uncrewed private spacecraft on the moon in February.
The Intuitive Machines IM-1 mission launched on February 15, aiming to become the first private spacecraft on the moon. It was also the first time the United States had landed a spacecraft on the moon since the Apollo era of the 1970s. In the final moments before touchdown on February 22, though, things were tense.
As the Odysseus lander touched down, controllers on Earth had trouble re-establishing communications. As NASA and the Intuitive Machines teams tried to figure out how to get data from the lander after its expected touchdown, the Morehead State University Space Science team became critical.
"It was a bizarre, complex, crazy idea that just absolutely worked," said Dr. Ben Malphrus.
Malphrus, the executive director of the MSU Space Science department, said the Intuitive Missions team, which owned the lander, was communicating with it using the Lunar Commercial Network. NASA was using its own Deep Space Network. When the Odysseus lander touched down, it tipped over, interrupting connectivity.
"We believe that one of the legs hit a rock and so it was on its side at that time with the antennas not pointing to Earth," said Chloe Hart, the Lead Ground Operator/Engineer at Morehead State University.
Turns out, the team at MSU had the capability to communicate on both networks. It just took a bit of coding.
"They were like, 'You've got four hours. Can you do it?,'" said Emily Walter, a staff member at MSU.
Walter had already written code to get them connected to the Deep Space Network.
"We took my old code and just started hacking out pieces that we didn't need for this, adding in the functions and necessary capabilities for this mission, and we got it working and were able to send commands to IM1," Walter said.
With Morehead State bridging the communication gap between NASA and Intuitive Machines teams, they were finally able to receive data from the lander—a giant leap for this Eastern Kentucky space program.
According to Congressman Hal Rogers, NASA Administrator Bill Nelson said, “Morehead State was the savior of our historic mission to the moon.”
"Morehead State University is out here doing some big things in the space industry. It's an incredible feeling," Hart said.
