Firefly Aerospace Inc. will deliver and operate Fleet Space Technologies’ Seismic Payload for Interplanetary Discovery, Exploration and Research (SPIDER) on the far side of the moon, the company announced today. The Australian-backed SPIDER payload will fly on Firefly's Blue Ghost lander, along with payloads from NASA and the European Space Agency, as part of the company’s second lunar mission in 2026, the company says.
"The Firefly team welcomes Fleet Space on our far side lunar mission that will serve as a critical building block for future human and robotic missions to come," says Bill Weber, CEO of Firefly. "Firefly proudly supports the growing lunar economy across the United States, Europe and now Australia, and we invite additional Artemis Accords nations to join us as we collectively build a sustainable presence on the Moon."
The SPIDER payload is part of the Australian Space Agency's Moon to Mars initiative aligned with NASA's Artemis program to support future habitation on the Moon. Upon deployment of the payload, Firefly's Blue Ghost lunar lander will provide ongoing power and communications, enabling SPIDER to capture seismic data from the lunar surface for up to 14 days, the company says.
"Fleet is thrilled to contribute our passive seismic SPIDER technology to Firefly's lunar mission to advance fundamental research into the Moon's regolith," says Matt Pearson, cofounder and chief exploration officer at Fleet. "Any infrastructure built on other worlds will depend on a deep understanding of the in-situ subsurface composition—and we're honored to collaborate with the international community to help unlock critical insights for sustaining human life beyond Earth."
In addition to SPIDER, Firefly's second lunar mission will deliver the European Space Agency's Lunar Pathfinder satellite to lunar orbit and NASA's LuSEE-Night radio telescope to the lunar surface as part of the NASA Commercial Lunar Payload Services (CLPS) initiative.
Firefly says it is concurrently wrapping up the final milestones for its first moon mission. Planned for 2024, that mission is meant to deliver 10 NASA-sponsored payloads aboard the Blue Ghost.
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