Israel’s Beresheet, the first non-governmental craft in the world to go to the moon, is sending a time capsule containing Israeli national symbols and cultural artifacts into space.
By: United with Israel Staff
The Israeli SpaceIL group and Israel Aerospace Industries (IAI) presented on Monday a time capsule that will travel to the moon with the first Israeli spacecraft.
The time capsule consists of three discs, each containing hundreds of digital files, which will launch from Cape Canaveral, Florida, in February.
The files traveling to the moon include Israeli national symbols, like Israel’s Declaration of Independence, the Bible, Israel’s national anthem “Hatikvah” and the Israeli flag.
The time capsule also includes cultural objects and materials, such as paintings collected from the public over the years for sending to the moon, dictionaries in 27 languages and encyclopedias as an indication of knowledge accumulated by humanity, Israeli songs, books of art and science and Israeli literature, information about Israeli scientific and technological discoveries and developments that influenced the world, and photos Israel’s landscapes and of leading figures in Israeli culture.
The time capsule, along with the spacecraft, will remain on the Moon indefinitely, even after completing Israel’s first lunar mission. With no plans to return to Earth, the spacecraft and information within the time capsule’s disks could possibly be found and distributed by future generations.
In February, the spacecraft, recently named Beresheet (the Hebrew word for Genesis), will launch alongside other satellites as a secondary payload on a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket. The precise launch date remains undetermined, as SpaceIL awaits final confirmation from the launch company.
‘Another Step on Our Way to the Moon’
“This is another step on our way to the moon,” said Ido Anteby, CEO of SpaceIL. “Inserting the disks into the spacecraft, which is a real time capsule, indicates the spacecraft’s readiness to blast off from the launch site in a few weeks.”
SpaceIL’s crews and IAI have completed testing of the spacecraft and its systems, and are preparing for the “beginning of the amazing and complex journey that exemplifies innovation, creativity and courage,” he added.
Yonatan Winetraub, one of three SpaceIL founders, said, as he inserted the time capsule into a spacecraft that “this is a very emotional moment. We do not know how long the spacecraft and the time capsule will remain on the moon. It is very possible that future generations will find this information and want to learn more about this historic moment.”
Opher Doron, IAI’s Space Division General Manager, noted the pride in being the first non-governmental entity in the world to go to the moon.
The spacecraft successfully completed a series of recent tests to examine the integration of systems and a series of complex experiments aimed at testing its durability, and will soon be transferred to Florida.