Successful Launch of Dual Robotic Mission Aiming for Lunar Commercial Exploration
This Wednesday, at precisely 7:11 AM (Spanish mainland time), SpaceX's Falcon 9 rocket successfully lifted off from NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida, USA. Onboard were two private robotic landers, one from the United States and the other from Japan, tasked with gathering data about the lunar surface to facilitate future missions to the Moon. This mission marks the first of several lunar undertakings planned for 2025.
As anticipated, following the safe return of the Falcon 9's first stage, the upper portion of the rocket continued its ascent, deploying both lunar landers into Earth orbit. The American lander, backed by NASA, was released shortly after 8:15 AM, and the Japanese lander from Ispace followed at 8:44 AM. Each lander has embarked on its independent trajectory toward the Moon.
The Blue Ghost, developed by Firefly Aerospace and part of NASA's Commercial Lunar Payload Services (CLPS) program, is expected to take 45 days to reach the lunar surface. It is scheduled to autonomously land in the Mare Crisium (Sea of Crises) in early March. If successful, the lander will operate for 14 days, adhering to a strict schedule of scientific tests. The objectives of this mission include testing lunar subsurface drilling technology, sample collection capabilities, radiation-tolerant computing, and lunar dust mitigation methods, as reported by the U.S. space agency.
In contrast, the Resilience lander, built by the Japanese company Ispace, will require nearly four times longer than the Blue Ghost to complete its journey. The mission will include several tests along the way. This lander has received updates following the failure of its inaugural mission in April 2023, which ended with a crash on the lunar surface due to a sensor malfunction. The Resilience lander is currently en route to Mare Frigoris (Sea of Cold) in the Moon's northern hemisphere. Upon arrival, it will deploy a small rover named Tenacious, which is designed to collect lunar dust samples and subsequently share them with NASA.
The NASA agency maintains numerous contracts with private companies to enhance the efforts of the Artemis program, which aims to land astronauts on the Moon by 2027 and eventually establish a base in the lunar south polar region, where water ice--considered the "new lunar gold"--is believed to be abundant.
Japanese companies are also eager to participate in the burgeoning space tourism industry. Ispace has predicted that by 2040, the Moon could host a population of 1,000 residents and welcome 10,000 visitors annually. The company aims to take the lead in the space economy by extracting lunar water and supplying experiments, materials, and other resources to governments and commercial entities. With major space powers and private companies like SpaceX gearing up for a return to the Moon, such projections are becoming increasingly plausible. According to a 2023 report by PwC, lunar transportation could generate approximately $350 billion by the end of the next decade.
