A Texas-based space company has successfully completed its first commercial lunar landing: Firefly Aerospace's Blue Ghost landed on the lunar surface and began its mission on Sunday.
“You're all stuck landing. We're on the moon,” Blue Ghost chief engineer Will Coogan said during a livestream of the landing, drawing loud applause from mission control.
Buzz Aldrin, the first American astronaut, celebrated Blue Ghost's success in a Facebook post.
“Contact light, engine shut down! Congratulations to Firefly Aerospace on the successful landing of Blue Ghost on the first mission to the Moon today!” Aldrin wrote in his message.
The event was the latest in a series of private attempts to land on the moon, but none of the previous attempts had been successful. Houston-based Intuitive Machines conducted a commercial mission to the lunar surface last year, but the craft landed on its side near the moon's south pole and stopped functioning.
Odyssey became the first American lunar module to land on the moon in 50 years, but it landed too quickly, catching one of its legs on the lunar surface and losing contact with Earth.
In 2023, a module from the Japanese company iSpace crashed on the surface of the Moon and turned out to be practically inoperable.
Firefly Aerospace of Cedar Park, Texas, announced that Blue Ghost's landing makes it “the first commercial company in history to achieve a fully successful soft landing on the Moon.”
Although it is a commercial mission, the Blue Ghost mission is part of NASA's Commercial Lunar Payload Services initiative, in which the administration contracts with third parties to deliver scientific equipment and other technology to the lunar surface. Blue Ghost is carrying instruments for 10 NASA research projects.
The Artemis manned mission is also part of the initiative. Blue Ghost also plans to take pictures of the total solar eclipse on March 14, when the Earth will be between the Moon and the Sun.
Shortly after landing early Sunday morning, Blue Ghost began transmitting images from the lunar surface to waiting scientists on Earth. It was one of two lunar landers launched aboard a Falcon 9 rocket from Kennedy Space Center in Florida on Jan. 15. The other lander, called Resilience, is scheduled to touch down on the moon in late May or early June.
Sourse: www.upi.com
