Private Japanese company ispace will launch its second-ever moon mission on a shared Falcon 9 rocket with Firefly Aerospace’s Blue Ghost lander next month. The historic Mission 2 aims to successfully land on the moon for the first time since Intuitive Machines’ Odysseus in February.
ispace’s new lander, Resilience, is designed to carry five payloads and will attempt a landing at Mare Frigoris, a large basaltic plain north of the lunar equator. The mission hopes to operate on the lunar surface and deploy a microrover called Tenacious to collect moon dirt and gravel.
Resilience shares its Falcon 9 rocket ride with Blue Ghost, which is carrying 10 science instruments and technology demonstrations for NASA’s Commercial Lunar Payload Services program. Both landers will launch in mid-January 2025 from Florida’s Space Coast.
A successful landing would be a historic achievement for private space companies, marking just the second time a privately funded spacecraft has landed on the moon. The mission marks ispace’s continued efforts to develop the lunar economy and capitalize on its achievements during Mission 1, which attempted to land on the moon in April 2023 but failed due to an altitude sensor error.
Source: https://www.space.com/the-universe/moon/double-moon-mission-spacex-to-launch-2-private-lunar-landers-in-january