Firefly Aerospace‘s moon-bound spacecraft has offered the closest factor to a reflecting pool in house, exhibiting Earth as an imposing monument, stacked on high of one other Earth.
The phantasm is a brand new picture taken earlier this week by the Blue Ghost lander, anticipated to aim a landing on the moon on March 2. The picture showcases two blue marbles, because of its mirror-smooth photo voltaic panel.
The faint dot above Earth, which could be seen within the uncropped picture beneath, is definitely the moon, a vacation spot to which it is since gotten a lot nearer. Additionally pictured is the spacecraft’s X-band antenna and a NASA instrument supposed to seize the primary world view of Earth’s magnetic subject.
Blue Ghost accomplished its translunar injection, a maneuver that places the spacecraft on a moon-bound trajectory, on Feb. 8.
“It’s a very precisely timed shot,” mentioned Joseph Marlin, deputy chief engineer, in a video replace on the mission. “Think of it as kind of throwing to someone who’s running across the field ahead of you. You have to kind of lead the shot.”
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UPDATE: Feb. 14, 2025, 9:43 a.m. EST At 8:51 p.m. ET on Thursday, the Blue Ghost spacecraft accomplished a four-minute engine burn that allowed it to enter lunar orbit. It should proceed circling the moon for the following 16 days earlier than trying to land.
That is the mission trajectory plan for Firefly Aerospace’s Blue Ghost lander.
Credit score: Firefly Aerospace graphic
Firefly’s lander, initially scheduled to carry off in late 2024, is the primary NASA Business Lunar Payload Companies mission of the yr. This system has invested $2.6 billion in contracts with distributors from the personal sector to assist ship devices to the moon and ship again essential information.
The corporate is carrying 10 experiments for the house company. NASA needs to see a common cadence of moon missions to organize for astronaut-led Artemis expeditions in 2027 or later.
In an uncropped picture, the moon is seen as a faint dot above Earth.
Credit score: Firefly Aerospace
After escaping Earth’s gravitational pull, the journey takes about 4 days to reach on the moon. However Firefly intends to spend a few weeks in lunar orbit earlier than dropping Blue Ghost, named after an unique kind of firefly, to the floor. The process to descend is anticipated to take about one hour.
The mission appears to be going easily, however the staff hasn’t encountered the toughest half but. Touchdown on the moon is onerous. The moon’s exosphere gives just about no drag to sluggish a spacecraft down because it approaches the bottom. Moreover, there are not any GPS programs on the moon to assist information a craft to its touchdown spot. Then there’s the truth that all the things is about six occasions tippier on the moon to beat.
To this point only one firm (versus house company), Intuitive Machines, has made the robotic journey all over lunar landing. Its craft landed sideways close to the moon’s south pole in February 2024, nonetheless managing to function from its awkward place.
