Launch Complex 39A, Cape Canaveral, Florida. A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket blasted off into space Wednesday carrying a pair of lunar landers on a journey to our closest celestial neighbor, kicking off what is expected to be a busy year of lunar missions amid a renewed race to establish a long-term human presence on the lunar surface. Tucked inside the rocket’s bullet-shaped nose cone were the two lunar landers, from two different nations. The first is Blue Ghost, a 6.6-foot-tall (2-meter) lunar lander developed by Firefly Aerospace, a company based in Cedar Park, Texas. Sharing a ride inside the Falcon 9 rocket’s cargo bay is a 7.5-foot-tall (2.3-meter) lunar lander from Tokyo-based Ispace. Wednesday’s launch kicked off the company’s second attempt to send one of its Hakuto-R spacecraft to the moon, following the Peregrine probe.
