Far from home
Look: 6 haunting images chronicle South Korea's history-making lunar mission
Danuri is South Korea’s first spacecraft to reach lunar orbit.
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Korea Aerospace Research Institute (KARI)
Last year, South Korea made history.
The country’s first lunar mission, the Korean Lunar Pathfinder Orbiter (KLPO), successfully launched in August 2022.
And in December, the spacecraft hit a big milestone: reaching lunar orbit.
Nicknamed Danuri, the spacecraft will orbit the Moon for about a year.
Danuri’s main objectives are to study the Moon’s surface, test out new technologies, and map out potential landing sites for a future Korean lunar mission.
6. As it drifted farther from home, the orbiter snapped this image of Earth on August 26.
5. A similar portrait of the far side of the Moon was taken on the same day.
4. In November, KARI released this sequence of images after Danuri watched the Moon cycle through its orbit.
3. A panorama of the Moon and Earth, so close yet so far apart, released in November.
2. After reaching lunar orbit in mid-December, Danuri sent back this image of Earth peeking over the Moon’s surface on Christmas Eve.