January 15, 2025, 1:57:35 PM IST (Published) 3 Min Read A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket launched a pair of lunar landers on Wednesday, January 15, from the Kennedy Space Center of NASA in Florida. The US agency gave a live stream of the event on its website around 40 minutes before the launch, which is scheduled at 1:11 am ET (11:41 am in India), CNN reported. In a statement, the Elon Musk-owned company noted that the Falcon 9 rocket launched Firefly Aerospace’s Blue Ghost Mission 1 and Japan-based company Ispace’s RESILIENCE lunar lander. It added that a backup opportunity is available on Thursday (January 16) at 1:09 am ET, if required. Blue Ghost, which has been tucked inside the rocket's nose cone, is a 6.6-foot-tall (2-metre) lunar lander, developed by the Texas-based company. This uncrewed mission marks Firefly Aerospace’s maiden launch to the lunar surface. The company serves as a contractor for NASA’s Commercial Lunar Payload Services (CLPS), a part of the US space agency’s Artemis program. Under this, NASA is planning to return humans to the Moon for the first time in over five decades. Sharing the ride inside the rocket’s cargo bay is the 7.5-foot-tall (2.3-metre) lunar lander of Ispace, a Tokyo-based company. This is its second attempt to send one of its Hakuto-R spacecraft to the lunar surface. Earlier, the company made its first attempt to land on the Moon in 2023, but its Hakuto-R spacecraft which was used on that mission crash-landed, thereby creating a pockmark on the lunar surface. Later, the failed landing attempt was attributed to the imprecise data about the altitude of that spacecraft. Although Ispace Hakuto-R and Firefly Aerospace Blue Ghost lunar landers are being sent together on the same ride to space, they will take different paths after the landing. According to SpaceX's official statement, the Blue Ghost lander will start its nearly 45-day journey to the Moon once it is deployed into a lunar transfer orbit. Watch Falcon 9 launch @Firefly_Space’s Blue Ghost and @ispace_inc’s RESILIENCE lunar landers to the Moon https://t.co/ZnAGQbLTPy