Israel’s First Moon Mission with a Special Passenger

Israeli scientists are giving the final touch to the country’s first space mission to the moon. Recently they have added a special passenger to the mission. The passenger is a time capsule, containing three digital discs, which have thousands of files and are ceremoniously placed within the space pod by organizers wearing white dust coats at the plant where it is being constructed and tested.

The capsule contains the drawings by children, some pictures of Israeli symbols like the flag, Israeli songs and a booklet written by a Jewish man about his personal account of the Holocaust. SpaceIL, one of the founders of the nonprofit organisation behind the launch has compared the time capsule to prayers written on pieces of paper that worshippers stuff into Jerusalem’s Western Wall, which is one of the holiest sites of Judaism.

The spacecraft, which weighs around 585 kilograms (1,300 pounds) is expected to be launched soon, though a final date has not been set, it is expected to be launched in the month of February next year. SpaceIL co-founder Yariv Bash said, “Back when we got started, we thought it was going to be a two-year project, the budget would be less than $10 million, and the spacecraft will weigh less than five kilograms. And here we are eight years later with a project with a budget of almost $100 million.”

The spacecraft will be sent via a Falcon 9 rocket from American entrepreneur Elon Musk’s SpaceX firm and will take around a month and a half to reach. The spacecraft will be launched from Cape Canaveral in the United States. The total cost of the project is $95 million, which is raised with the support of private philanthropists providing funding. SpaceIL has also partnered with state-owned Israel Aerospace Industries.

The organizers believe if the mission is successful, it will not only be Israel’s first spacecraft to land on the moon, but also become the first private spacecraft and with the success of this mission, Israel would be the fourth nation to land on the moon. It is named as Beresheet or Genesis in Hebrew, the name has been chosen by the people and which resembles a tall, oddly shaped table with round fuel tanks under the top.

The Israeli space mission will measure the magnetic field and try to investigate how the moon was formed. The data will then be shared with US space agency NASA. Opher Doron, general manager of IAI’s space division, said, “I’ve seen hundreds of kids look at the spacecraft and you see in their eyes that they say, 'Wow, if a small country can do this maybe little old me can do almost anything”.

Israel’s space mission project began as part of the Google Lunar XPrize, in the year 2010, when it offered $30 million as awards to encourage scientists and entrepreneurs to come up with relatively low-cost moon missions. Though not a single winner of the prize has reached the moon so far, Israel’s team continued to push forward to achieve the goal.