Historic lunar landing by Austin-area based Firefly Aerospace is this weekend
Cedar Park, TX (KXAN) — In the early morning hours of Sunday, March 2, a lunar lander built just north of Austin, Texas will touchdown on the lunar surface. It will be the first lunar lander built in the area to land on the moon and one of only a few private companies to do so.
Firefly Aerospace built Blue Ghost One as part of NASA’s Commercial Lunar Payload Services (CLPS) initiative. The mission will carry several experiments to the moon, each of which will assist future manned missions and are expected to help pave the way for people living on the moon.
Blue Ghost One launched from Cape Canaveral, FL on January 15th. The week’s long journey allowed several experiments to be conducted, while ensuring the lander reached the moon on March 2.
“We’ve been in low lunar orbit for a few days now. As we get closer to that March 2 landing date, we’re at a very low, almost circular orbit around the moon,” said Ray Allensworth, Spacecraft Program Director with Firefly Aerospace.
Once ready, the lander will flip over and begin its descent to the surface. The trip will take about 12 minutes.
A moon with a view
Video and photos taken of the lunar surface by the spacecraft will assist in this descent.
“Google Earth, you have the wonderful privilege of getting to zoom down into the tiniest details and see cars and license plates and people walking around the streets. We don’t have that level of detailed information about the moon,” said Kevin Scholtes, Future Systems Architect with Firefly Aerospace.
“As the lander is coming in, we’re getting much, much higher resolution information, and that’s greatly improving our ability to land, helping us identify hazards, helping us figure out where the softest, safest spot is to touch down,” Scholtes said.
These new photos and video will greatly improve the chances for success of the autonomous landing of Blue Ghost One.
The room where it happens
Allensworth expects the control room to get tense in the moments leading up to landing. “It gets really, really quiet in the Mission Operations Center. Everyone’s looking at data very, very focused. You could just hear a pin drop.”
Once the lander reaches the ground, the crew will take readings to ensure the health of the lander. If things look good, “then I think we’ll all just kind of erupt into joy, high fives, hugs, all of that,” Allensworth said.
Then the experiments begin. Several NASA projects are on board Blue Ghost One. This includes systems that will check GPS capabilities, a device for measuring the distance from the Earth to the Moon, an x-ray telescope and a drill.
“Getting to poke holes in the lunar surface and see what the interior is hard to pass up,” said Scholtes.
The future of the moon
After two weeks, night will descend on the moon. Temperature will plummet and Blue Ghost One will freeze.
“It will be there forever. It’s this monument now that will live on the lunar surface. I think it means a lot to us, kind of, it’s like a piece of your soul,” Allensworth said.
Two more Blue Ghost missions are planned for the next few years.
KXAN will be hand for the landing this weekend. Stay tuned for updates.
