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land·er | \ ˈlan-dər 
\
\Definition of lander
: one that lands especially : a space vehicle that is designed to land on a celestial body (such as the moon or a planet)
Examples of lander in a Sentence
Recent Examples on the Web Back in February, the White House asked for $3.37 billion in fiscal year 2021 to accelerate development of the lander.
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Eric Berger, Ars Technica, "Congress may allow NASA to launch Europa Clipper on a Falcon Heavy," 7 July 2020 Jeff Bezos's rocket company, Blue Origin, and SpaceX are among the companies competing for a contract to build a crew-worthy lunar lander.
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Jackie Wattles, CNN, "This is the company NASA wants to deliver its 'water-hunting' robot to the Moon," 11 June 2020 Costing $828 million, the InSight lander was the space agency’s first probe to reach the Red Planet in six years, following the August 2012 landing of the Curiosity Rover.
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Fox News, "NASA has a 'mole' problem on Mars," 9 July 2020 In the same month-long launch window—which occurs every 26 months, when the planet aligns with Earth for easier traversal—it will likely be joined by China’s Tianwen-1 orbiter and lander, also a first mission to Mars for the rising space power.
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Jonathan O'callaghan, Scientific American, "Summer on Mars: NASA's Perseverance Rover Is One of Three Missions Ready to Launch," 7 July 2020 The plan calls for the golf-cart-sized VIPER to roll off of Astrobotic’s lander at a still-undetermined locale in the vicinity of the moon’s south pole in 2023.
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Leonard David, Scientific American, "NASA’s Hunt for Lunar Water Intensifies," 24 June 2020 The accelerated timeline has been widely criticized as unrealistic, given ongoing delays with the rocket NASA plans to use for the mission and the need to develop a lunar lander.
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Jackie Wattles, CNN, "NASA picks new head of human spaceflight as astronaut launches return to US soil," 12 June 2020 For its first mission, Vulcan will launch Astrobotic's Peregrine lander to the Moon, which in turn is part of NASA's CLPS program to send payloads to the lunar surface.
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Eric Berger, Ars Technica, "Rocket Report: Brazil opens equatorial launch site, Kerbal launch slips," 12 June 2020 Astrobotic's lunar lander is designed only to carry robots and other cargo.
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Jackie Wattles, CNN, "This is the company NASA wants to deliver its 'water-hunting' robot to the Moon," 11 June 2020
See MoreThese example sentences are selected automatically from various online news sources to reflect current usage of the word 'lander.' Views expressed in the examples do not represent the opinion of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.
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Time Traveler for lander
The first known use of lander was in 1859
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