Private US spacecraft captures magnificent view of Earth

(Cape Canaveral) A private US spacecraft bound for the Moon has captured stunning images of Earth a week into its flight.

Still orbiting Earth, Firefly Aerospace’s lunar lander ignited its thrusters Thursday to set off toward the Moon in more than a month. Baptized Blue Ghostthe spacecraft transmitted photos and videos of our planet. The Texas company released the images on Friday.

It carries experiments for NASA, part of its efforts to return astronauts to the Moon this decade.

Blue Ghost is one of two lunar landers launched from Florida by SpaceX on January 15. It is expected to touch the lunar surface on March 2. The other lander is sponsored by Japanese company ispace and takes an even longer route, with a planned landing in late May or early June.

This is the first flight to the Moon for Firefly and the second for ispace, which crashed its first lander on the Moon in 2023. ispace’s latest lander based in Tokyo, Resilienceis still in orbit around the Earth and is carrying out all its maneuvers to get closer to the Moon.