Science News Roundup: China launches classified communication satellite with powerful rocket; Moon lander Odysseus tipped sideways on lunar surface but 'alive and well' and more

Houston-based Intuitive Machines also revealed that human error led to a failure of the spacecraft's laser-based range finders, how engineers detected the glitch by chance hours before landing time, and how they improvised an emergency fix that saved the mission from a probable crash. China launches classified communication satellite with powerful rocket China on Friday launched the 11th satellite under a classified Chinese military programme with the country's most powerful rocket.

Following is a summary of current science news briefs.

US achieves first moon landing in half century with private spacecraft

A spacecraft built and flown by Texas-based company Intuitive Machines landed near the moon's south pole on Thursday, the first U.S. touchdown on the lunar surface in more than half a century and the first ever achieved by the private sector. NASA, with several research instruments aboard the vehicle, hailed the landing as a major achievement in its goal of sending a squad of commercially flown spacecraft on scientific scouting missions to the moon ahead of a planned return of astronauts there later this decade.

Moon lander Odysseus tipped sideways on lunar surface but 'alive and well'

The moon lander dubbed Odysseus is "alive and well" but resting on its side a day after its white-knuckle touchdown as the first private spacecraft ever to reach the lunar surface, and the first from the U.S. since 1972, the company behind the vehicle said on Friday. Houston-based Intuitive Machines also revealed that human error led to a failure of the spacecraft's laser-based range finders, how engineers detected the glitch by chance hours before landing time, and how they improvised an emergency fix that saved the mission from a probable crash.

China launches classified communication satellite with powerful rocket

China on Friday launched the 11th satellite under a classified Chinese military programme with the country's most powerful rocket. Chinese state media reported the successful launch of the satellite from the southern island of Hainan with a Long March 5 rocket.

Stratolaunch conducts 'captive carry' test flight of hypersonic vehicle

Private U.S. company Stratolaunch conducted its second "captive carry" test flight of what it hopes will become a reusable hypersonic vehicle, it said on Saturday, as the Pentagon presses ahead with development of new hypersonic weapons. The Stratolaunch Talon-A was loaded with live propellant and carried aloft by the Spirit of Mojave, a modified Boeing 747-400 with dual fuselages, on a more than four-hour flight going over the Pacific Ocean.

(With inputs from agencies.)