Leonard David's INSIDE OUTER SPACE

Image credit: Firefly Aerospace

From the folks that brought you the successful robotic Moon lander, the Blue Ghost, Firefly Aerospace has new news about the group’s second lunar outing in 2026.

Add into the payload mix the United Arab Emirates Rashid 2 Rover – a Blue Ghost foray to the far side of the Moon.

Moon mobility

UAE’s Rashid 2 Rover will demonstrate lunar surface mobility and on-the-spot resource utilization technologies.

The Rashid 2 Rover, outfitted with multiple cameras and probes, is slated to demonstrate lunar surface mobility on the far side of the Moon and utilize various materials on its wheels to evaluate their durability when exposed to lunar dust. Information gleaned is meant to help guide the development of future lunar technologies, such as spacesuits, habitats, and other critical infrastructure.

Elytra vehicle will first deploy Blue Ghost and the European Space Agency’s Lunar Pathfinder satellite in lunar orbit.
Image credit: Firefly Aerospace

Firefly’s Elytra vehicle

During Blue Ghost Mission 2 operations, Firefly’s Elytra vehicle will first deploy the Blue Ghost lander and the European Space Agency’s Lunar Pathfinder satellite in lunar orbit.

Blue Ghost will then touch down on the far side of the Moon to deliver the UAE’s Rashid 2 Rover, Australia’s Fleet Space-supplied Seismic Payload for Interplanetary Discovery, Exploration and Research (SPIDER) payload, NASA’s Lunar Surface Electromagnetics Experiment-Night (LuSEE-Night) and User Terminal.

NASA involvement comes as part of the space agency’s Commercial Lunar Payload Services (CLPS) initiative.

Australia’s Fleet Space-supplied Seismic Payload for Interplanetary Discovery, Exploration and Research (SPIDER) payload.
Image credit: Fleet Space

Long-haul communications

Elytra will remain in lunar orbit to provide long-haul communications and enable radio frequency calibration services for LuSEE-Night.

LuSEE-Night is a pathfinder which will study the Moon’s radio environment and potentially take a first look at a previously unobserved era in our cosmic history.

Firefly has already begun qualifying and assembling flight hardware for Blue Ghost Mission 2.

The Cedar Park, Texas-based group completed the first fully successful commercial Moon landing on March 2 of this year, performing 14 days of surface operations and marking the longest commercial operations on the Moon to date.

Blue Ghost sits on lunar surface – marking the the longest commercial operations on the Moon to date.
Image credit: Firefly Aerospace