Intuitive Machines is able to go to the moon. The corporate introduced Monday that its first lunar lander has accomplished all remaining integration milestones and is now encapsulated in SpaceX’s Falcon 9 payload fairing, the place it should keep till launch on February 14.

The mission launch window opens at 12:57 a.m. EST; ought to climate or different points delay the mission, SpaceX could have three days to execute the launch. The tight timeline comes all the way down to the main points of the mission: The lander is taking a direct trajectory to the moon, and it’s concentrating on a website close to the lunar south pole, the place particular lighting circumstances for touchdown are solely accessible a number of days every month.

This might be Intuitive Machines’ first lunar mission. The Houston-based firm was based 11 years in the past by Stephen Altemus, who serves as president and CEO; Tim Crain, CTO; and prolific house business entrepreneur Kam Ghaffarian. The corporate was early to see the industrial promise of the moon; it acquired its contract from NASA for this mission again in 2019. Extra just lately, Intuitive Machines went public by way of a merger with a particular function acquisition firm in February 2023, although the transaction generated much less capital than was initially projected.

There’ll possible be lots of eyes on the mission, on condition that it follows on the heels of an unsuccessful try by one other American firm, Astrobotic, whose lander failed to succeed in the moon because of a disastrous propellant leak. That spacecraft burned up within the Earth’s environment as a part of a coordinated reentry plan on January 18.

Each corporations have been chosen for his or her respective missions as a part of NASA’s Industrial Lunar Payload Companies (CLPS) program, designed to solicit transportation companies to the moon from personal business. In whole, NASA is paying Intuitive Machines $118 million to ship its six science and know-how payloads to the lunar floor.

The CLPS program can be a key a part of the company’s Artemis program; the thought is that industrial suppliers ship scientific payloads to the floor, which is able to gather information and inform future crewed moon missions.

Intuitive Machines is hoping to pave the way in which for industrial success within the nascent lunar economic system, with the corporate engaged on not simply lunar landers however a lunar information relay service, a lunar rover and different applied sciences and companies for each the moon’s floor and cislunar house.

“The IM-1 mission’s success will lay the groundwork for a burgeoning lunar economic system, opening new prospects for analysis, commerce, and exploration,” the corporate stated in a press package revealed final week. “By advancing our capabilities to function on the lunar floor, the mission units the stage for extra bold endeavors, together with the institution of lunar bases and the exploration of potential sources.”

Along with the six NASA payloads, the lander will even carry a handful of business payloads for purchasers together with Columbia Sportswear and the modern artist Jeff Koons. The lander, dubbed Odysseus, is anticipated to function for seven days on the moon earlier than the lengthy and chilly lunar night time units in.