Danuri (KPLO)
Danuri (a blend of 'dal' for moon and 'nurida' for enjoy) is South Korea's first deep space probe. Launched on August 4, 2022, it used a ballistic lunar transfer (BLT) via Sun-Earth L1 to conserve fuel, entering a 100-km circular polar lunar orbit in December 2022. It carries six instruments, including the Korean Lunar Terrain Imager (LUTI), a wide-angle polarimetric camera (PolCam), a magnetometer, and NASA's ShadowCam—which images shadowed polar craters using starlight and Earthshine to find exposed water ice for Artemis missions.
Mission Imagery & Gallery
Primary Achievement
South Korea's first lunar mission; operates NASA ShadowCam to image permanently shadowed polar craters with 200x optical sensitivity.
Mission Objectives
- Develop foundational core technologies for deep space exploration and lunar telecommunications
- Generate high-resolution polarimetric and topographic maps of candidate future landing sites
- Operate NASA ShadowCam to inspect permanently shadowed regions at 200 times higher sensitivity than LROC
Timeline Events
- 2022-08-04 — Launched from Cape Canaveral SLC-40 aboard Falcon 9 on a 4.5-month ballistic transfer.
- 2022-12-16 — Captured into lunar orbit after completing final lunar trajectory burn.
- 2022-12-28 — Achieved mission operational circular polar orbit at 100 km altitude.
- 2023-01-12 — ShadowCam released first stunning images of permanently shadowed interior of Shackleton crater.
Related Missions
- Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) (2009) · NASA
- Artemis I (2022) · NASA
- Chandrayaan-3 (2023) · India
Historical & Technical Sources
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