SpaceX is set to launch a historic mission on January 15th, sending two landers to the Moon’s cratered Mare Crisium region for the first time in over 40 years. The Falcon 9 rocket will carry Firefly Aerospace’s Blue Ghost 1 lander and iSpace’s Resilience lander, marking a significant milestone in space exploration.
The mission aims to deploy NASA payloads to study the Moon’s resources, history, and interactions with Earth. One of these payloads, LEXI, is an x-ray machine that can read the Earth’s magnetic field, providing insights into solar weather patterns and their impact on our planet’s power grids and satellite systems.
This marks NASA’s second attempt at deploying such technology, following a failed 2012 launch known as STORM. The upcoming mission promises to collect valuable data, including particulate compositions, thermal properties, and electromagnetic activity of both the Moon and Earth. With the successful deployment of these landers, SpaceX is poised to make history and pave the way for future lunar exploration.
Source: https://www.theverge.com/2025/1/7/24338415