(CNN) — A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket blared toward space Wednesday carrying a pair of lunar landers on a journey to our closest celestial neighbor — kicking off what’s expected to be a bustling year of moon missions amid a renewed race to establish a long-term human presence on the lunar surface.
The SpaceX rocket took off from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida at 1:11 a.m. ET.
Tucked inside the rocket’s bullet-shaped nose cone were the two lunar landers — hailing from two different countries. The first is Blue Ghost, a 6.6-foot-tall (2-meter-tall) lunar lander developed by Firefly Aerospace, a Cedar Park, Texas-based company.
The uncrewed mission marks Firefly’s first foray into sending a spacecraft to the lunar surface. The company is a contractor for NASA’s Commercial Lunar Payload Services, or CLPS, which is part of the space agency’s Artemis program — a framework under which NASA plans to return humans to the moon for the first time in more than 50 years.
“It’s a good time for the lunar economy,” Firefly Aerospace CEO Jason Kim told CNN in December, adding that he’s “100% confident in our team’s ability” — even if success isn’t guaranteed for Blue Ghost’s inaugural flight.
Sharing a ride inside the Falcon 9 rocket’s cargo bay is a 7.5-foot-tall (2.3-meter-tall) lunar lander from Tokyo-based Ispace. Wednesday’s launch kicked off the company’s second attempt to send one of its Hakuto-R spacecraft to the moon.
Ispace is a company that aims to sell its services to space agencies or private companies seeking to put science or other payloads on the moon. Similar to Pittsburgh-based Astrobotic Technology, which developed the Peregrine lunar lander that met a fiery end during its first attempted mission in January 2024, the company has its roots in the Google Lunar XPrize. The competition offered $20 million to any company that could get a lander to the lunar surface in an effort to spur space technology innovation in the private sector. (The contest ultimately ended in 2018 with no winner as development processes took longer than expected.)
Ispace, which is now a publicly traded company on the Tokyo stock exchange, made its first moon landing attempt in 2023, but the Hakuto-R spacecraft used on that mission ultimately crash-landed, creating a fresh pockmark on the lunar surface. The company later attributed the failed landing attempt to imprecise data about the spacecraft’s altitude.
But Ispace said it’s back — armed with lessons learned — and ready to execute a soft touchdown the second time around.
“We gathered huge data, very valuable data, from mission one,” Jumpei Nozaki, the company’s chief financial officer, said on Monday. “So we 100% are going to utilize this (on) mission two. And, yes, we have confidence to make a successful mission this time.”
Both Firefly and Ispace confirmed they have established communication with the Blue Ghost and Resilience landers, respectively, after launch. Both spacecraft are healthy and operating as expected as they embark on their lunar journeys.
The looming lunar trek
The Ispace Hakuto-R and Firefly Aerospace Blue Ghost lunar landers may be hitching the same ride to space, but they will take different paths to the moon.
The Hakuto-R and Blue Ghost landers are now beginning their individual journeys.
Ultimately, Blue Ghost will spend about 25 days orbiting Earth before making a four-day trek to the moon and spending a couple weeks in lunar orbit. Firefly confirmed a target landing date of March 2.
The Hakuto-R lander, called Resilience, is taking an even slower path to the moon.
“It’s a low-energy trajectory,” Nozaki said. “But it’s not necessarily something bad. We can verify many kind of systems during this long journey.”
The company has not publicly set an expected landing date for Resilience, but Nozaki told CNN that the spacecraft will follow a path similar to that of the last Hakuto-R mission — taking four to five months to reach the moon.
Hakuto-R’s inaugural mission failed because the spacecraft miscalculated its descent as it passed over a crater, causing it to plummet about 3 miles (5 kilometers ) to the ground, according to Ispace.
“Almost everything performed perfectly — propulsion system, communication system, and also structure,” Nozaki said of the first Hakuto-R mission. “The issue was the software and the altitude measurement has some issue.”
A NASA spacecraft captured an image of the impact crater created during the crash landing.
What’s on board the Blue Ghost moon lander
Blue Ghost will seek to touch down on the lunar surface near Mons Latreille, an ancient volcanic feature in a more than 300-mile-wide (483-kilometer) basin called Mare Crisium, or “Sea of Crises,” on the far eastern edge of the moon’s near side.
On board Blue Ghost is a group of science instruments and technology demonstrations to test satellite navigation, radiation-adapted computers, self-cleaning glass that can clear away lunar dust, and a “Lunar PlanetVac” to collect and sort soil samples on the moon, according to Firefly Aerospace.
Kim, the company’s CEO, said he is also excited about the possibility of sharing images and footage the Blue Ghost lander may capture.
“There’s a phenomenon called the lunar horizon glow that only the Apollo 15 and 17 astronauts have seen with their eyes,” Kim told CNN. “We’re going to be able to capture that in 4K-by-4K high-definition video and share that with the rest of the world.”
Lunar horizon glow occurs when photons from the sun react with the moon’s soil, or regolith, causing electrostatic particles to float. The lofted dust scatters the light.
Blue Ghost will operate for about 14 days on the moon’s surface until its landing zone is thrust into lunar nighttime. During the dark period, temperatures can drop to minus 280 degrees Fahrenheit (minus 173 degrees Celsius), forcing the spacecraft to cease operations.
What’s on board Resilience
Underpinned by its motto “Never Quit the Lunar Quest,” Ispace is seeking redemption with its Resilience lander.
The company’s first lunar landing attempt aimed to put a Hakuto-R lander in the Atlas crater on the northeastern corner of the moon’s near side.
This go-around, Ispace aims for a different lunar location: a 750-mile-long (1,200-kilometer) plain called Mare Frigoris — or the “Sea of Cold” — which lies in the moon’s far northern reaches.
Mare Frigoris is significantly flatter than the Atlas crater region, potentially offering easier-to-navigate terrain. In a statement, Ispace said the new landing site was chosen because it offers “flexibility.”
The region also features conditions ripe for a miniature rover, called Tenacious, to explore, the company said. The vehicle, which stands 10 inches (26 centimeters) tall and weighs about 11 pounds (5 kilograms), is designed to disembark from the Resilience lander and explore the surrounding terrain.
The rover, developed by Ispace’s European branch with co-funding from the Luxembourg Space Agency, is equipped with a small shovel to collect a sample of lunar soil. Ispace intends to transfer ownership to NASA — but the sample itself will remain on the moon, according to Nozaki. (NASA did not comment on the matter during a Tuesday news conference.)
The lander itself is also carrying experiments and tech demos, including a water electrolyzer and a module that will test algae-based food production. The payloads were provided by corporations as well as academic institutions.
What’s more, commemorative objects, such as a metal plate that pays homage to Japanese sci-fi franchise Gundam, and artwork are on board the spacecraft.
Swedish artist Mikael Genberg has contributed a miniature red house dubbed the “Moonhouse.” Genberg has been aiming to put a red house on the lunar surface for more than two decades.
“The Moonhouse, the first house on the moon, could be an expression of humanity’s ability to achieve the seemingly unattainable through boundary-crossing thoughts and collaborations and maybe a symbol of humanity’s eternal and collective striving; a perspective on existence and (an) eye towards Earth,” according to a web page about the art project.
The project hopes to follow a slew of other novelties, art pieces and curiosities that have been part of past lunar missions.
A Jeff Koons sculpture series called “Moon Phases,” for example, flew on the Odysseus lunar lander from Houston-based Intuitive Machines last year, becoming the first “authorized” work of art on the moon.
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