Blue Ghost, private spacecraft, lands on Moon

A private spacecraft, known as Blue Ghost, has landed on the Moon, becoming the second ever commercial vehicle to do so. The craft set off on 15th January, with American company Firefly Aerospace launching it. It had intended to explore the Sea of Crises, a massive crater visible from the Earth.

This project is the latest collaboration between a private company and NASA.

Intuitive Machines is another corporation that hopes to land its spacecraft, Athena, near the south pole of the Moon, hoping to reach it in the coming days. It had been the first private company to achieve a lunar landing when its spacecraft, Odysseus, touched down on 22nd February 2024.

That mission didn’t end well, however. Odysseus landed on the slope of a crater, breaking its landing gear, before toppling over.

Blue Ghost’s landing was much smoother. It orbited the moon for two weeks before descending onto the lunar surface. Firefly staff in Texas cheered and applauded after learning that their landing had been successful. This makes Blue Ghost the first successful private venture to the Moon. The vehicle remained intact and responsive.

The team

“demonstrated a technology for landing on the surface of the Moon, the kind that had been forgotten after the Apollo era when we had astronauts”

on the moon, Dr Simeon Barber, a planetary science researcher from the Open University told the BBC.

The value of the Moon to private firms, according to Dr Barber, would be for it to act as a launch pad to explore further out into space.

“By going to the Moon, we can learn how to run robotic instruments in space [and] in the really harsh environment of the Moon, which is at times hot and at times cold. It’s very dusty, there’s lots of radiation,” he said.

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