Lunar Prospector

Launched on January 7, 1998 aboard an Athena II rocket, Lunar Prospector’s 19-month mission was to map the surface composition of the Moon, measure magnetic and gravity fields and study lunar outgassing events from a low polar orbit. Its work done, Lunar Prospector was then guided to impact in Shoemaker crater near the lunar south pole. The aim of that was to release a plume of water vapour from ice in the shadowed area of the crater but none was observed. The spacecraft carried some of astrogeologist Eugene Shoemaker’s remains (the first commercial payload delivered to the Moon), making him the only human whose remains have been placed on another celestial body.