The latest private lunar lander is slightly close to its destination. Blue Ghost of Jugnu Aerospace fired its engines on the morning of 18 February, marking the latest stage in the moon’s 45 -day long journey.
The engine burn, which started at ET at 3:09 pm and lasted for three minutes and 18 seconds, moved the lander, from February 13 to a lower orbit in a high eggs around the moon. From its new convenience point of 75 miles (120 km) from the surface, the blue ghost was able to catch the distant new imagery of the moon and relay it back to Earth.
Our #Ghost rider This morning completed another lunar class maneuver with 3 minutes, 18 seconds burn. This exercise transferred a lander to a very less elliptical orbit from a high elliptical orbit around the moon. Shortly after the burn, Blue Ghost captured incredible footage … pic.twitter.com/ygymvpabw4
– firefly aerospace (@firefly_space) February 18, 2025
The blue ghost is required to prepare for its employed 2 March landing attempt, the change comes with a negative side, as the fireplace in the Texas will have a duration of temporary communication blackouts between the crafts and its carers.
The 45-day journey between Planetary takeoff and Lunar Touchdown allowed Blue Ghost Handlers to examine onboard instruments. If all go according to the plan, the blue ghost will settle in its new house in an area of the moon, which is known as a mare chrysium, or sea of crises. The basin was created by an ancient asteroid collision, and once filled with basaltic lava. The 10 devices of the lander will be placed to work to analyze the flow of heat from the interior of the moon, magnetic and electric fields on the surface and the chemical composition of lunar soil. This mission will also test the technology that can play a role in NASA’s Artemis missions, which is aimed at putting human shoes on the moon for the first time since 1972.
Blue Ghost has taken some circuit road to some extent on a lunar surface trip. Instead of a direct shot from Kennedy Space Center to The Moon, its journey included several weeks in the orbit around the Earth after the launch of January 15. During that time, its cameras caught some of our fantastic shots of our planet, even one selfie or two.
Blue Ghost is just the latest private lander to try a moon landing, although the result is mixed on that front. In April 2023, Japanese company Ispace’s Hakuto-R M1 lander crashed while trying its touchdown.
Peregreen of Astrobotic, the first private American attempt in a landing, also did not rent well, faced a terrible failure shortly after being launched in January 2024. Only a month later, the oadisius of the spontaneous machine was successful, where the paragrin failed, although it faced a broken leg. It was omitted on the moon.
Blue Ghost Land needs safely, its short order will have some new company. ISPACE is trying its luck again with its flexibility lander, which was launched on the same Falcon 9 rockets as a blue ghost. That spacecraft has taken a slow approach to the moon, and will try a landing for some time in May or June. There is a taut rover in the lander, which will be used to examine lunar soil around the planned landing spots of flexibility in the remote north of the moon.
If this is not enough moon exploration for you, then there is another mission in machines with intuitive knowledge that may be launched soon as next week. The mission will include a robot that is designed to hop to the surface to detect a pit in a permanent shade.
