Leonard David's INSIDE OUTER SPACE

Image credit: SpaceX

Earth’s moon is to be on the receiving end of a spent rocket stage in early August – the leftovers from a SpaceX Falcon 9 launch last year.

Firefly’s Blue Ghost Mission 1, named Ghost Riders in the Sky, launched on January 15, 2025 and performed the first fully successful commercial lunar landing on March 2 at Mare Crisium near Mons Latreille. That lander went on to mark the longest commercial operation on the moon to date.

Also riding onboard that SpaceX booster was Japan’s HAKUTO-R M2 lunar lander, called Resilience. However, that probe was lost roughly 90 seconds before touchdown, plowing into the stark lunar terrain.

SpaceX rocket stage.
Image credit: SpaceX via Project Pluto

A certain carelessness

Meanwhile, that Falcon 9’s leftover upper stage, labeled 2025-010D that lobbed the two private spacecraft into space is now headed for a run in with the moon.

“It doesn’t present any danger to anyone, though it does highlight a certain carelessness about how leftover space hardware is disposed of.”

For more details, go to my new Space.com story – “A stray SpaceX rocket stage could slam into the moon this August, amateur astronomer says” – at:

https://www.space.com/space-exploration/launches-spacecraft/a-stray-spacex-rocket-stage-could-slam-into-the-moon-this-august-amateur-astronomer-says

Projected impact point of rocket hardware.
Image credit: Project Pluto