Two commercial lunar landers, Firefly Aerospace’s Blue Ghost 1 and ispace’s Resilience, have made significant progress in their respective missions to the Moon.
Firefly Aerospace confirmed that its Blue Ghost 1 lander entered orbit around the Moon on February 13. The lander performed a four-minute burn of its reaction control system thrusters at 8:51 p.m. Eastern, placing it in an estimated orbit between 150 and 5,673 kilometers above the lunar surface.
The company has not disclosed specific details about the orbit but amateur trackers monitoring the spacecraft’s radio signals estimate this range. Firefly stated that Blue Ghost 1 will perform additional maneuvers to move into a circular orbit before attempting a landing on March 2.
The lander is carrying 10 NASA payloads through the agency’s Commercial Lunar Payload Services program, with its planned landing site near Mare Crisium. The company and NASA announced the scheduled landing time as 3:45 a.m. Eastern on February 14.
Meanwhile, ispace’s Resilience lunar lander performed a successful lunar flyby on February 14, passing about 8,400 kilometers from the lunar surface at 5:43 p.m. Eastern. The company aims to establish a lunar orbit insertion burn in early May and conduct a landing attempt in the Mare Frigoris region.
Takeshi Hakamada, founder and CEO of ispace, expressed confidence in his team’s achievements, citing steady progress toward mission milestones. Both companies have outlined their success criteria for their respective missions, with Firefly focusing on achieving lunar orbital insertion as its 10th milestone from launch to operations after sunset.
Intuitive Machines’ IM-2 lunar lander mission is set to launch on February 26, aiming for a landing in the Mons Mouton region near the Moon’s south pole on March 6. This latest development highlights the growing competition and interest in commercial lunar missions, as multiple companies vie for opportunities in the space industry.
Source: https://spacenews.com/blue-ghost-1-enters-lunar-orbit-as-resilience-flies-by-the-moon