Spectacular images: ‘Firefly’ lander touches down on the moon!

A private lunar lander carrying scientific instruments for NASA successfully touched down on the moon Sunday, marking a major milestone for commercial space exploration.

Firefly Aerospace’s Blue Ghost lander descended autonomously, aiming for the slopes of an ancient volcanic dome in the moon’s northeastern Mare Crisium basin.

Historic Private Moon Landing

The confirmation of the successful touchdown came from Firefly’s mission control in Texas, 225,000 miles away. “You all stuck the landing. We’re on the moon,” announced Will Coogan, Firefly’s chief lander engineer. This achievement makes Firefly the first private company to land a spacecraft on the moon without crashing or tipping over—a feat that even some nations have struggled to accomplish.

Only five countries—Russia, the U.S., China, India, and Japan—have previously achieved successful moon landings. Now, Firefly joins the elite club of lunar pioneers. Within 30 minutes of landing, Blue Ghost began transmitting images, including a sun-drenched selfie and a breathtaking shot of Earth as a tiny blue dot in the vast darkness of space.

NASA’s Push for a Lunar Economy

Blue Ghost’s landing is part of NASA’s commercial lunar delivery program, which aims to boost private-sector involvement in space exploration. The agency paid Firefly $101 million for the delivery, plus $44 million for the onboard scientific and technology payloads. This marks the third mission under the initiative, paving the way for future astronaut missions later this decade.

Equipped with 10 NASA-backed experiments, the lander carries a vacuum to collect lunar soil, a drill to measure subsurface temperatures, and a device designed to mitigate abrasive moon dust—an issue that plagued Apollo astronauts. The instruments will function for two weeks before the lunar night forces them to shut down.

More Private Landers on the Way

The race to the moon is heating up, with two more private landers set to arrive soon. Houston-based Intuitive Machines is launching its second lunar lander, targeting a site 100 miles from the south pole this Thursday. Their first lander, despite a leg break and tip-over, made history last year as the first U.S. moon landing since Apollo 17 in 1972.

Meanwhile, Japan’s ispace is also making a second attempt. Its first lander crashed in 2023, and this time it’s taking a slower, fuel-efficient route, aiming for a moon landing in three months.

NASA Embraces Private Sector Risks

Despite previous failures, NASA is committed to launching two private lunar landers annually, acknowledging that some missions will fail. “This opens up a whole new way to get more science to space and the moon,” said NASA’s top science officer Nicky Fox.

Unlike Apollo missions, which had multi-billion-dollar budgets and astronaut pilots, today’s private companies operate on tighter budgets with fully automated robotic landers. But Firefly CEO Jason Kim believes the effort is paying off.

“We got some moon dust on our boots,” Kim said, celebrating the historic achievement.