Originally published at: https://boingboing.net/2024/02/28/lunar-lander-with-broken-leg.html
…
7 Likes
If they were hoping for smooth sailing they probably should have named it after someone else.
32 Likes
Seems like the “successful” landers like to land on their sides. Shouldn’t we just make the landers ball-shaped, or have “flipper” arms on all sides to reorient if needed?
11 Likes
10 Likes
Trying not to anthropomorphize the robot with a broken leg all alone in the cold. 
10 Likes
Other bad Greek mythical figures to name a spacecraft after:
Icarus
Phaeton
Eurydice
Agamemnon
People who did not have safe return trips.
14 Likes
NASA gave these guys millions of dollars. How nice for them.
2 Likes
Waaait a minute now you’re just taking design ideas from pinball machines.
4 Likes
Yes.
12 Likes
This is why we do prototypes and test, but definitely get that figured out before man flights.
The Japanese probe also landed on its side.
2 Likes
Got them broken leg, long lunar night blues…
3 Likes
That would be Luna 9:
Video is cued:
4 Likes
it was designed to land on its side ( and then was supposed to kip up. ) its problem was that it landed on its nose. 
poor thing.
eta:
uh oh. i hope you’re able to get home okay…
5 Likes
Rookie mistake. Kerbal Space Program taught me that you don’t bother with flimsy landing legs, but smash into the surface using a ridiculously durable space plane fuselage/fuel tank part:
9 Likes
Cripes! Just another argument for socialialized healthcare! Like, how many times do we need to have a baseball bat leaned against our collective skulls?
1 Like
Maybe the moon is at a different angle than we thought? 
4 Likes
Ugh! Icy roads? The same thing happened to two friends of mine at the beginning of the year. I feel it’s happening much more in the Nordics this winter than before.
1 Like
Yup. Sorry to derail the thread.
Briefly: I always walk (5 km) to and from the office. I wore light crampons. They were not enough.
Yes, the orthopedic clinic and surgery department I was in (Stockholm) was backed up to the brim, with full rooms and surgery backlog.
One morning I was prepped and brought down to the surgery rooms area, just to be sent back because a couple of emergencies had popped up. In the end I got surgery at 1.00 in the night four days after - the only slot available.
Cold weather (-18 ℃) and snow (love them) was followed by close to 0 ℃ temperatures, leaving a nasty, compact, ice sheet everywhere.
5 Likes
This does make me wonder about the wisdom of the Starship HLS design which will take astronauts to the surface on the Artemis III mission. I get the whole 1950s Destination Moon look:
But this is a vessel that doesn’t need to travel through an atmosphere. And the astronauts will need to learn how to land a pencil on its end. Though I’m mostly sore that the next time we go to the Moon, the spaceship won’t look more like this:
9 Likes
