Home SpaceX launches lunar landers Blue Ghost and Resilience on historic moon missions

SpaceX launches lunar landers Blue Ghost and Resilience on historic moon missions

TLDR

  • SpaceX launched two lunar landers, Blue Ghost and Resilience, on Jan. 15.
  • Blue Ghost will land in March, and Resilience aims for a May/June touchdown.
  • The mission supports NASA's Artemis program and future lunar exploration.

SpaceX has launched a pair of lunar landers on Wednesday (Jan. 15) from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida. The Firefly Aerospace’s Blue Ghost and Resilience has been jointly built by US and Japanese companies in a bid to energize missions to the moon.

At 1:11 am EST, the landers launched aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket. To keep costs down, they shared the ride at first but went their separate ways about an hour into the flight, just as planned. Each is now taking its own roundabout path for the long journey ahead, which will last several months.

The mission, called “Ghost Riders in the Sky,” is Firefly’s first trip to the moon with their Blue Ghost lander. It’s part of NASA’s Commercial Lunar Payload Services (CLPS) program, carrying 10 NASA research and technology payloads to help the agency learn more about the lunar environment as they prepare to send astronauts back to the moon through the Artemis Program.

For ispace, this is their second lunar mission. Their Hakuto-R lander reached lunar orbit in March 2023, but unfortunately, it crashed during its touchdown attempt the following month.

Blue Ghost, named after a species of fireflies found in the Southeastern US, is expected to reach the moon first. At 2 meters tall, the lander aims to touch down in early March at Mare Crisium, a volcanic plain located in the moon’s northern latitudes.

The ispace lander, named Resilience, is a bit bigger and will take a little longer to get to the moon. Its journey will last about four to five months, with a planned touchdown in late May or early June at Mare Frigoris, even farther north on the moon’s near side.

SpaceX’s ‘race to the moon’

Earlier this week, ispace’s founder and CEO Takeshi Hakamada said: “We don’t think this is a race. Some people say ‘race to the moon,’ but it’s not about the speed.”

Firefly CEO Jason Kim added: “We’ve done everything we can on the design and the engineering.”

In a press release, NASA Deputy Administrator Pam Melroy stated: “Each flight we’re part of is vital step in the larger blueprint to establish a responsible, sustained human presence at the Moon, Mars, and beyond. Each scientific instrument and technology demonstration brings us closer to realizing our vision.”

The launch of Blue Ghost and Resilience sets the stage for an exciting year of moon missions. Houston-based Intuitive Machines, fresh off the successful lunar landing of its first Nova-C lander, Odysseus, in February 2024, is gearing up to launch its IM-2 mission as early as next month.

SpaceX is also planning to test an in-space propellant transfer between two docked Starships. The key milestone is crucial for refueling SpaceX’s Starship HLS vehicle, paving the way for an uncrewed moon landing demonstration the following year.

Featured image: SpaceX

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Suswati Basu
Tech journalist

Suswati Basu is a multilingual, award-winning editor and the founder of the intersectional literature channel, How To Be Books. She was shortlisted for the Guardian Mary Stott Prize and longlisted for the Guardian International Development Journalism Award. With 18 years of experience in the media industry, Suswati has held significant roles such as head of audience and deputy editor for NationalWorld news, digital editor for Channel 4 News and ITV News. She has also contributed to the Guardian and received training at the BBC As an audience, trends, and SEO specialist, she has participated in panel events alongside Google. Her…

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