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Two lunar landers built by private companies in the US and Japan left Earth aboard a SpaceX rocket as part of a joint trip to the moon.
Falcon 9 lifted off from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida at 01:09 local time (06:09 GMT) on Wednesday, carrying landers from Firefly Aerospace of the United States and ispace of Japan.
The landers will eventually separate once they reach lunar orbit and conduct independent exploration.
This is the latest in a growing number of commercial flights to the moon.
The Firefly rover, Blue Space, is expected to take about 45 days to reach the Moon after separating from the SpaceX rocket.
It will then drill, collect samples, and take X-ray images of Earth’s magnetic field to “advance research for future human missions to the Moon and provide insight into how space weather affects the planet,” according to SpaceX.
Meanwhile, ispace’s Resilience lander will take up to five months to reach the lunar surface, where it will deploy a rover to explore and try to scoop up loose material from the surface, known as regolith.
NASA is backing the effort, which, if successful, would be the largest commercial moon landing ever.
Intuitive machines last year became the first commercial company to put a lander on the moona feat previously accomplished only by the United States, the Soviet Union, China, India and Japan.
In addition, SpaceX is also conducting the seventh orbital test of its Starship rocket, which is scheduled to lift off from Texas at 16:00 local time (22:00 GMT).
