Firefly Aerospace, a Texas-based company, achieved a significant milestone yesterday, March 2, 2025, with its Blue Ghost lunar lander successfully touching down on the moon. This marks the first fully successful moon landing by a commercially built and operated robotic spacecraft, making Firefly the second private company to accomplish a lunar landing, following Intuitive Machines’ Odysseus mission in 2024 (though Odysseus landed on its side).
The Blue Ghost Mission 1, launched on January 15, 2025, atop a SpaceX rocket from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center, softly landed in Mare Crisium, a large lunar basin, at approximately 3:34 a.m. EST (8:34 a.m. EAT). The lander descended at a gentle 2.2 miles per hour, carrying 10 NASA instruments as part of the agency’s Commercial Lunar Payload Services (CLPS) initiative, aimed at fostering a private lunar economy.
The mission, valued at $101 million under a NASA contract, has already transmitted over 27 GB of scientific data back to Earth during its journey, surpassing previous CLPS missions in data volume. Firefly’s team in Austin, Texas, celebrated the upright, stable landing, which kicks off a two-week research period to study lunar subsurface properties, heat flow, and Earth’s magnetosphere, among other objectives. CEO Jason Kim emphasized the cost-effectiveness of the mission, noting it was achieved at a fraction of the historical cost of lunar landings, which once required billions and state backing. Stunning images from the lunar surface, including one showing the lander’s shadow with Earth in the background, have been shared widely.
Firefly’s success positions it as a leader in the growing commercial space sector, with plans for two more lunar missions under CLPS, the next scheduled for 2026. The company also recently secured an $8.2 million grant from the Texas Space Commission to expand its spacecraft manufacturing in Central Texas and a $21.81 million contract to launch a U.S. Space Force mission with its Alpha rocket, further highlighting its rapid growth. Posts on X reflect excitement about the landing, with some users noting Firefly’s ongoing Alpha rocket missions, targeting five launches in 2025.
