Robotic vehicles from Firefly Aerospace of Texas and Ispace of Japan will part ways early Wednesday after launching from the same SpaceX rocket. Both are aiming for the lunar surface.
A space twofer is scheduled to take place early Wednesday morning — two lunar missions for the price of one rocket launch.
A SpaceX Falcon 9 will lift off from the Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida, carrying the Blue Ghost lander built by Firefly Aerospace of Austin, Texas, and the Resilience lander from Ispace of Japan.
When is the launch and how can I watch it?
The launch is scheduled for 1:11 a.m. Eastern time on Wednesday. Forecasts predict a 90 percent chance of favorable weather.
SpaceX will provide coverage of the launch on the social media platform X beginning about one hour before liftoff, or around 12:10 a.m. NASA will start a live video stream at 12:30 a.m. of Blue Ghost and the payloads it is carrying for the agency, which you can watch in the video player above. Ispace will provide coverage of its Resilience lander in English and Japanese starting at 12:20 a.m.
If needed, a backup launch time is available on Thursday at 1:09 a.m., although the weather is less favorable.
Why are two moon landers sharing one rocket?
That is the result of fortuitous scheduling by SpaceX and not something that was planned by Firefly or Ispace.