Tag: Firefly

Since last night four more launches globally

10:26 am

UPDATE: The Firefly launch was a failure. There was a problem during stage separation. See post above.

The worldwide pace of launches continues now relentlessly. Since my last launch post yesterday afternoon, there were four more launches across the global.

First, China launched a “group” of satellites for an “internet constellation,” its Long March 5B rocket lifting off from its coastal Wencheng spaceport. The rocket used a new upper stage which allowed its core stage to shut down sooner and thus not enter orbit to later crash uncontrolled (as earlier Long March 5B cores would do). Instead it fell back into the ocean after launch.

Next, SpaceX sent another 23 Starlink satellites into orbit, its Falcon 9 rocket lifting off from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida. The first stage, flying for the very first time, landed successfully on a drone ship in the Atlantic.

Third, Arianespace, the commercial division of the European Space Agency (ESA), used the Italian rocket company Avio’s Vega-C rocket to place an ESA Earth observation radar satellite dubbed Biomass into orbit, lifting off from French Guiana. This was Arianespace’s second launch in 2025. Though Arianespace managed the launch, it is being phased out. By next year all future launches of Vega-C will be sold and managed by Avio instead, cutting out this bureaucratic middle-man.

Fourth, the American rocket startup Firefly attempted to place a Lockheed Martin demo payload into orbit, its Alpha rocket lifting off from Vandenberg in California. The Lockheed Martin payload is part of a deal that could include as many as 25 launches over the next five years. This was Firefly’s first launch in 2025.

A scheduled launch by Russia of its Angara rocket on a classified military mission was apparently scrubbed, though no information at all has been released as to why the launch did not occur.

The leaders in the 2025 launch race:

50 SpaceX
23 China
5 Rocket Lab
5 Russia

SpaceX now leads the rest of the world in successful launches, 50 to 40.

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Firefly wins Space Force contract to test orbital maneuvers with its Elytra space tug

12:33 pm

Firefly yesterday announced it has been awarded a Space Force contract to use its Elytra space tug to test orbital maneuvers designed for military purposes.

As part of the mission, Elytra will host a suite of government payloads, including optical visible and infrared cameras, a responsive navigation unit, and a universal electrical bus with a payload interface module. Firefly’s Elytra Dawn configuration will utilize common components from the company’s launch vehicles and lunar landers, including the avionics, composite structures, and propulsion systems, to enable on-demand mobility, plane changes, and maneuvers with high delta-V capabilities and reliability.

Though unstated, the inclusion of cameras suggests the Pentagon wants to test Elytra’s ability to maneuver close to other satellites and photograph them.

This contract further illustrates Firefly’s effort to diversify its space products. Like Rocket Lab, it is not relying solely on its rocket division to make money, but is also developing and selling a range of space products, from lunar landers to orbital tugs to satellite equipment.

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Firefly awards Blue Origin subsidiary contract to build rover for third Blue Ghost mission

9:12 am

Blue Ghost 3 landing site
Blue Ghost 3 landing site

Firefly yesterday announced that it has awarded the Blue Origin subsidiary Honeybee Robotics a contract to build a rover for its third Blue Ghost mission to the Moon.

Firefly Aerospace and Honeybee Robotics, a Blue Origin company, today announced Honeybee was contracted by Firefly to provide the lunar rover for the company’s recently awarded NASA task order to explore the Gruithuisen Domes on the Moon’s near side in 2028. Once deployed on the Moon by Firefly’s Blue Ghost lander, Honeybee’s rover will carry NASA instruments to investigate the unique composition of the Gruithuisen Domes.

The funding for this rover actually comes from NASA, awarded first to Firefly which has in turn given a subcontract to Honeybee.

Before this 2028 mission however Firefly will launch its second Blue Ghost mission to the Moon, targeting a 2026 launch date. That second mission will not only land on the far side of the Moon, it will also deploy two lunar orbiters, one for European and the second Firefly’s own orbital tug for these spacecraft that will also service as a communications satellite after deployment.

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Firefly releases movie of lunar sunset

9:59 am

Sunset on the Moon
Click for original image.

Using imagery taken by Firefly’s Blue Ghost lander, the company today released a short movie showing sunset on the Moon, from several different angles.

I have embedded that movie below. The picture to the right, cropped, reduced, and sharpened to post here, is one of the photos from that movie. It shows the Sun on the horizon, with the Earth above it and Venus the small bright dot in between.

One alien aspect of the Moon that that while the Sun (and Venus) slowly crossed the sky during Firefly’s two week mission, going from just after sunrise in the east to sunset in the west, the Earth remained stationary in this location above the horizon. This phenomenon occurs because the length of the Moon’s day and its orbit around the Earth are the same length, so that one hemisphere always faces the Earth. Blue Ghost landed in Mare Crisium on the eastern edge of that hemisphere. At that location the Earth always hangs at this spot in the sky.
» Read more

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Blue Ghost watches the Earth eclipse the Sun from the Moon

10:23 am

Eclipse as seen by Blue Ghost
Click for original image.

Firefly’s Blue Ghost lunar lander last night successfully recorded images and data as the Earth slowly over hours crossed the face of the Sun, producing an eclipse.

The image to the right, cropped and reduced slightly to post here, is one such image. From the Firefly update page:

Captured at our landing site in the Moon’s Mare Crisium around 3:30 am CDT, the photo shows the sun about to emerge from totality behind Earth. This marks the first time in history a commercial company was actively operating on the Moon and able to observe a total solar eclipse where the Earth blocks the sun and casts a shadow on the lunar surface. This phenomenon occurred simultaneously as the lunar eclipse we witnessed on Earth.

The company has the right to tout its success, since it is the first of five private companies to actually succeed at a landing on the Moon. However, this is not the first such eclipse captured by a lander on the Moon. Surveyor 3 did it in April 1967, while Japan’s Kaguya orbiter did it also in 2009. (Watch this great lecture outlining the entire Surveyor program, presented during the 50th anniversary of its success. Hat tip reader Richard M.)

It is now past noon on the Moon, the temperatures will begin dropping, and Firefly will begin reactivating some instruments for the final week of operations before lunar sunset and shutdown for the long very cold lunar night.

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NASA releases Blue Ghost movie landing while Firefly prepares lander to observe solar eclipse of the Moon by Earth

8:54 am

NASA today released a fantastic movie of Firefly’s Blue Ghost lunar lander as it touched down on the Moon on March 2, 2025, taken by four cameras mounted on the underside of its Blue Ghost lunar lander.

I have embedded the movie below.

The compressed, resolution-limited video features a preliminary sequence that NASA researchers stitched together from SCALPSS 1.1’s four short-focal-length cameras, which were capturing photos at 8 frames per second during the descent and landing.

The sequence, using approximate altitude data, begins roughly 91 feet (28 meters) above the surface. The descent images show evidence that the onset of the interaction between Blue Ghost’s reaction control thruster plumes and the surface begins at roughly 49 feet (15 meters). As the descent continues, the interaction becomes increasingly complex, with the plumes vigorously kicking up the lunar dust, soil and rocks — collectively known as regolith. After touchdown, the thrusters shut off and the dust settles. The lander levels a bit and the lunar terrain beneath and immediately around it becomes visible.

Engineers will use this imagery to better anticipate and possibly reduce the amount of dust kicked up during future landings.

Meanwhile, Firefly engineers are preparing the lander to observe tomorrow night’s lunar eclipse, but from a completely different perspective. On Earth we will see the Earth’s shadow slowly over five hours cross the Moon. On the Moon Blue Ghost will see the Earth cross in front of the Sun. Because of our home world’s thick atmosphere, there should be a ring remaining during totality.

Because the Moon will be in shadow during the eclipse, the challenge will be power management, operating the spacecraft solely on its batteries.
» Read more

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Blue Ghost activates NASA drill, prepares for hot lunar noon

9:16 am

Map of lunar landing sites
Landing sites for both Firefly’s Blue Ghost and
Ispace’s Resilience

More than a week after landing in Mare Crisium, ground controllers have prepared Firefly’s Blue Ghost lunar lander for surviving the very hot lunar noon while also activating NASA’s LISTER drill, which proceeded to successfully drill down into the lunar surface below the lander.

Mounted below Blue Ghost’s lower deck, NASA’s Lunar Instrumentation for Subsurface Thermal Exploration with Rapidity (LISTER) payload is a pneumatic, gas-powered drill developed by Texas Tech University and Honeybee Robotics that measures the temperature and flow of heat from the Moon’s interior.

I have embedded below the video of this drilling operation. At this moment it appears that nine of the lander’s payloads have completed their tasks successfully, with no indication yet that the tenth playload will have problems. All in all, Firefly has succeeded in establishing itself now as the leading private company capable of launching spacecraft to other worlds.
» Read more

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Blue Ghost landed almost dead center within its target zone

10:55 am

Blue Ghost on the Moon
Click for before and after blink animation

The picture to the right, taken by Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) prior to the successful landing of Firefly’s Blue Ghost lunar lander, shows its entire landing region. The inset in the lower left is a picture taken by LRO on March 3, 2025, after landing.

The full picture was taken near sunset, with sunlight coming from the left. The inset was taken at sunrise, with sunlight coming from the right. This explains the difference in shadows between the two. Blue Ghost is the white dot in the inset with its long shadow, the black streak, cutting through the nearby crater. The first picture taken from the lander after landing looked down that shadow, looking across the crater.

The new picture tells us that Blue Ghost landed almost dead center in its target zone, indicating that the engineering worked as planned. The lander also used its computer brain to pick a good landing spot and avoid the nearby craters.

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Blue Ghost lunar surface operations proceeding as planned

9:13 am

According to a Firefly update today, all of Blue Ghost’s planned lunar surface operations are working as planned.

Eight out of 10 NASA payloads, including LPV, EDS, NGLR, RAC, RadPC, LuGRE, LISTER, and SCALPSS, have already met their mission objectives with more to come. Lunar PlanetVac for example successfully collected, transferred, and sorted lunar soil from the Moon using pressurized nitrogen gas.

I have embedded below the video posted at the link of Lunar PlanetVac deploying and then blowing that gas to capture surface soil.
» Read more

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Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter snaps picture of Blue Ghost on the Moon

11:21 am

Blue Ghost on the Moon
Click for full image. For original of inset go here.

Shortly after Firefly’s Blue Ghost lunar lander touched down within Mare Crisium on the Moon, the science team for Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) used it to capture a picture of lander on the surface of the Moon.

That image is to the right, reduced to post here. The inset was expanded and sharpened to bring out the details, with the arrow showing Blue Ghost, that tiny dot in the center with a shadow to the right.

The Firefly Blue Ghost lunar lander set down on 2nd March 2025. The landing site (arrow) is about 4000 meters from the center of Mons Latreille, a large volcanic cone [seen to the left].

…LRO was 175 kilometers east (19.294°N, 67.956°E) of the landing site when the NACs acquired this dramatic view of the landing site on 02 March 2025 at 17:49 UTC.

Blue Ghost landed shortly after lunar sunrise, and is designed to operate for one full lunar day (fourteen Earth days). Whether it can survive the 14-day-long lunar night won’t be known until the next sunrise.

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Blue Ghost: Earth’s GPS constellations work on the Moon

8:50 am

Using an engineering test GPS-type receiver built by the Italian Space Agency, engineers have successfully been able to use the GPS-type satellites from two different constellations to pinpoint the location of Firefly’s Blue Ghost lander on the Moon.

The road to the historic milestone began on March 2 when the Firefly Aerospace’s Blue Ghost lunar lander touched down on the Moon and delivered LuGRE, one of 10 NASA payloads intended to advance lunar science. Soon after landing, LuGRE payload operators at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, began conducting their first science operation on the lunar surface.

With the receiver data flowing in, anticipation mounted. Could a Moon-based mission acquire and track signals from two GNSS constellations, GPS and Galileo, and use those signals for navigation on the lunar surface?

Then, at 2 a.m. EST on March 3, it was official: LuGRE acquired and tracked signals on the lunar surface for the first time ever and achieved a navigation fix — approximately 225,000 miles away from Earth.

Obviously, this is a first-time engineering test. A portable version of LuGRE will now have to be developed. However, this success means that any operation on the near side of the Moon will not need the addition of a new GPS-type constellation in lunar orbit. It also will likely simplify the design of any constellation for providing this capability to the far side.

Meanwhile, Blue Ghost continues to operate as planned on the surface, with all instruments functioning and several already collecting data.

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Live stream of the lunar landing of Firefly’s Blue Ghost

7:27 pm

Map of lunar landing sites
Landing sites for both Firefly’s Blue Ghost and
Ispace’s Resilience

I have embedded below the live stream from Firefly of tonight’s landing attempt on the Moon of its Blue Ghost lander. The stream goes live at 1:30 am (Central), with the landing targeting 2:45 am (Central).

The map to the right shows the location, in Mare Crisium. For context the map also shows the landing sites for several Apollo missions, as well as the location where Ispace’s first lander, Hakuto-R1, crashed, inside Atlas Crater. Also shown is the landing site of Ispace’s second lander, Resilience, in the north in Mare Frigoris.

Overall Blue Ghost’s nominal mission is engineering, to prove the lander can get to the Moon, touch down softly, and operate on the surface. If all goes well it will operate for about a week plus, during the lunar day. Whether it can survive the 14-day-long lunar night won’t be known until the Sun rises there and ground engineers can see if they can re-establish contact.

» Read more

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Close-up of Blue Ghost’s landing zone on the Moon

12:26 pm

Close-up of Blue Ghost's landing zone
Click for original image.

The science team for Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) on February 21, 2025 posted the picture to the right, reduced and sharpened to post here, showing in close-up the March 2, 2025 landing zone for Firefly’s Blue Ghost lunar lander.

The Blue Ghost landing region (image center, 18.56°N, 61.81°E) is heavily cratered due its ancient age (>3 billion years). … The landing region is near a large volcanic cone, Mons Latreille, which formed billions of years ago as part of the massive outpouring of basaltic magma that filled much of the Crisium basin.

Despite the many craters, there are plenty of smooth spots in this landscape. The real challenge for the lander is finding its way to them.

For a map showing this location on the Moon, go here.

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Blue Ghost instrument proves Earth-orbiting GPS-type satellites can be used to track location from the Moon

9:16 pm

Having now reached lunar orbit in preparation for its landing on March 2, 2025, an engineering test instrument on Firefly’s Blue Ghost lunar lander has now proven that even from that distance spacecraft can use the multiple GPS-type satellites in Earth orbit to track their position.

The Lunar GNSS Receiver Experiment (LuGRE) acquired and tracked Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) signals for the first time in lunar orbit – a new record! This achievement, peaking at 246,000 miles, suggests that Earth-based GNSS constellations can be used for navigation in transit to, around, and potentially on the Moon. It also demonstrates the power of using multiple GNSS constellations together, such as GPS and Galileo, to perform navigation. After lunar landing, LuGRE will operate for 14 days and attempt to break another record – first reception of GNSS signals on the lunar surface.

This test is a very big deal. It tells us that operations on the Moon, at least those on the near side, will likely not require a GPS-type infrastructure in lunar orbit, thus allowing a lot of difficult missions to proceed sooner while saving a lot of money and time.

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Blue Ghost lowers its lunar orbit while shooting a movie of the Moon

3:12 pm

The company Firefly announced that its lunar lander Blue Ghost successfully completed 3:18 minute engine burn that tightened its orbit around the Moon.

This maneuver moved the lander from a high elliptical orbit to a much lower elliptical orbit around the Moon. Shortly after the burn, Blue Ghost captured incredible footage of the Moon’s far side, about 120 km above the surface.

I have embedded the movie below. Quite spectacular indeed. The spacecraft is still on target for a March 2, 2025 landing attempt.
» Read more

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Blue Ghost enters lunar orbit, targets March 2, 2025 for landing

9:50 am

Map of lunar landing sites
Landing sites for both Firefly’s Blue Ghost and
Ispace’s Resilience

Blue Ghost on February 13, 2025 successfully completed a long four-minute engine burn to complete its transfer from Earth to lunar orbit, with a target date for the actual landing on March 2, 2025.

Now that the lander is in lunar trajectory, over the next 16 days, additional maneuvers will take the lander from an elliptical orbit to a circular orbit around the Moon. Blue Ghost Mission 1 is targeted to land Sunday, March 2, at 3:45 a.m. EST.

NASA has also announced the live stream coverage during landing:

Live coverage of the landing, jointly hosted by NASA and Firefly, will air on NASA+ starting at 2:30 a.m. EST, approximately 75 minutes before touchdown on the Moon’s surface. Learn how to watch NASA content through a variety of platforms, including social media. The broadcast will also stream on Firefly’s YouTube channel. Coverage will include live streaming and blog updates as the descent milestones occur.

I will embed the Firefly live stream when it becomes available.

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Firefly wins $8.2 million grant from Texas Space Commission

9:36 am

The new Texas Space Commission, established in 2023 by the state legislature and appropriated $350 million to encourage the development of a Texas aerospace industry, has awarded the rocket and lunar lander company Firefly $8.2 million grant.

Firefly said the funding will result in an additional 5,600 square feet of cleanroom space at its 50,000-square-foot spacecraft facility in Cedar Park, as well as added ground and test equipment, a spacecraft pressure proof test facility at the 200-acre campus in Briggs that has 200,000-square-feet of facilities, and upgraded infrastructure for mission operations and labs. The company’s Cedar Park headquarters is 28,000 square feet. The improvements are expected to be completed by the end of this year.

The 50 jobs will be added in engineering, quality assurance, manufacturing and spacecraft operations, according to the announcement. The grant also will enable the company to expand STEM outreach and internship programs, including working with the schools in the University of Texas System to provide hands-on experience in spacecraft development.

Though the commission was given $350 million to help industry, in truth the legislature allocated $200 million of that money to build a new “research and training facility” at Texas A&M. While this might help encourage engineering students to come to Texas and thus settle there within the industry, to me it looks like the commission was mostly created to distribute a very large chunk of cash to this one university.

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Blue Ghost leaves Earth orbit

9:06 am

Artist rending of Blue Ghost on the Moon
Artist rending of Blue Ghost on the Moon

Firefly’s Blue Ghost lunar lander has successfully completed the mid-course correction engine burn that has taken it out of Earth orbit and into a transfer orbit to the Moon.

After a successful Trans Lunar Injection burn on Saturday, Feb. 8, Firefly’s spacecraft carrying NASA science and tech to the Moon has departed Earth’s orbit and begun its four-day transit to the Moon’s orbit. Blue Ghost will then spend approximately 16 days in lunar orbit before beginning its descent operations. Since launching more than three weeks ago, Blue Ghost has performed dozens of health tests generating 13 gigabytes of data. All 10 NASA payloads onboard are currently healthy and ready for surface operations on the Moon.

I post the artist’s rendering of Blue Ghost to the right to contrast its design with Intuitive Machines’ Odysseus lunar lander that fell over when it landed last year. Note how much lower to the ground Blue Ghost is. This will certainly reduce the chances it will have the same problem as Odysseus, even if one leg breaks upon landing.

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Blue Ghost makes second orbital burn, setting up transfer from Earth to lunar orbit

9:14 am

Blue Ghost's first view of the Moon
Blue Ghost’s first view of the Moon.
Click for original image.

Firefly’s Blue Ghost lunar lander has successfully completed its second orbital burn, raising its Earth orbit in preparation for its shift into lunar orbit in the coming weeks.

Routine assessments while Blue Ghost is in transit show that all NASA payloads continue to be healthy. Firefly and NASA’s payload teams will continue to perform payload health checkouts and operations before reaching the Moon, including calibrating NASA’s Lunar Environment Heliospheric X-ray Imager (LEXI), continued transit operations of the Lunar GNSS Receiver Experiment (LuGRE), and analysis of radiation data collected from the Radiation Tolerant Computer (RadPC) technology demonstration.

The picture to the right looks across the top of Blue Ghost, with the small bright object beyond its first image of the Moon. The actual landing is at least four weeks away.

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Firefly planning five launches from Vandenberg in 2025

9:00 am

In announcing its plans to begin launches from both Wallops Island in Virginia and Esrange in Sweden in 2026, Firefly has also said it is planning five launches from Vandenberg in 2025.

Proposed spaceports surrounding Norwegian Sea
Proposed spaceports surrounding Norwegian Sea

The company is also building a launchpad at Cape Canaveral, so if these plans reach fruition it will eventually have four different launch sites. One issue for all these sites remains red tape. For example:

[Firefly VP Adam] Oakes said Firefly is continuing to work on regulatory issues for launches from Esrange. “The regulatory piece can really put you back if you want to let it,” he said. “We have a lot of paperwork in place. We’re not quite there on everything but things are moving in the right direction.”

One serious problem for Esrange is its interior location in Sweden. Any orbital launch will have to cross land, with most crossing significant territory of other countries. While the site has been used for decades for suborbital test launches, no orbital launches have ever taken off from there, and getting clearance will not be easy for orbital rockets to cross either Norway, Finland, or Russia. And unless the lower stages are reusable they will have to crash inside those territories, or inside Sweden itself.

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