SpaceX Falcon 9: Liftoff of Two Lunar Landers | Firefly Aerospace & ispace

SpaceX Falcon 9: Liftoff of Two Lunar Landers | Firefly Aerospace & ispace

On Wednesday, January 15, 2025, a SpaceX Falcon 9 launch vehicle successfully launched Firefly Aerospace’s Blue Ghost Mission 1 and ispace's Resilience lunar lander from Launch Complex 39A (LC-39A) at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida at 1:09 a.m. ET. This was SpaceX’s 100th launch from the historic Launch Complex 39A. The pad was constructed in the 1960s to accommodate the Saturn V launch vehicle, and has been used to support NASA crewed space flight missions, including the historic Apollo 11 moon landing and the Space Shuttle.

This was the fifth flight for the first stage booster supporting this mission. It previously launched Crew-9, RRT-1, and two Starlink missions. Following stage separation, the first stage landed on the Just Read the Instructions droneship stationed in the Atlantic Ocean.

Once deployed into a lunar transfer orbit, the Blue Ghost lander will begin its approximate 45-day journey to the Moon, where it will land in Mare Crisium for NASA’s payloads to perform numerous science and technology demonstrations, including lunar subsurface drilling, sample collection, and X-ray imaging of Earth’s magnetic field to advance research for future human missions on the Moon and provide insights into how space weather impacts the planet.

The Blue Ghost lander flight will deliver ten NASA science instruments and technology demonstrations to the Moon.

After its deployment, the ispace Resilience lander will begin its 4-5 month journey to the Moon. During their mission, ispace aims to achieve a soft landing on the lunar surface, to deploy its Tenacious micro rover, to explore the Moon’s surface, and collect regolith.

Learn more about Firefly's Blue Ghost Lander
https://fireflyspace.com/blue-ghost/

Learn more about ispace's Resilience Lander & Tenacious Rover

https://ispace-inc.com/m1

Video Credit: SpaceX 

Capture Date: Jan. 14, 2025

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