Flight controllers peered at their screens in Tokyo as minutes went by with only silence from the moon. A grim-faced team surrounded Hakamada as he announced that the landing likely failed.

A Japanese company had hoped that the second time would be the charm for putting a robotic lander on the moon. But it appears to have failed again. Five hours after the landing time of 3:17 p.m ...

Ispace's previous attempt at a moon landing in 2023 ended in failure. The space vehicle crashed onto the moon's surface. It crashed due to glitches in the software and the altitude measurement.

Of those, only the U.S. has landed people on the moon: 12 NASA astronauts from 1969 through 1972. NASA expects to send four astronauts around the moon next year.

Find out what time the full moon rises on July 10, 2025, how to see the Buck Moon from your location, and why it looks bigger near the horizon.

More than six hours after communication ceased, the Tokyo company ispace confirmed what everyone had suspected, saying there was “a high probability” that the lander had slammed into the moon.