*

Ispace's ( IPCEF ) Resilience aims for moon landing after 2023

failure

*

Firefly's Blue Ghost to be third CLPS moon lander

*

Blue Ghost touch down planned in March, Resilience in

May-June

*

NASA's Artemis program faces potential changes under Trump

administration

(Recasts with actual launch, quote, background, paragraphs 1,

4, 8)

By Joey Roulette and Kantaro Komiya

ORLANDO, Florida/TOKYO, Jan 15 (Reuters) - Two moon

landers, one from Japan's ispace and another from U.S.

space firm Firefly, lifted off on Wednesday from Florida on a

SpaceX rocket in an unusual double moonshot launch, underscoring

the global rush to peruse the lunar surface.

Japanese moon exploration company ispace launched its

Hakuto-R Mission 2, making its second attempt to land on the

moon after an initial mission in April 2023 failed in its final

moments because of an altitude miscalculation.

Texas-based Firefly Aerospace launched its first moon

lander, Blue Ghost, which would make it the third company to

launch a moon lander under NASA's public-private Commercial

Lunar Payload Services (CLPS) program.

"The 'rideshare' launch with Firefly is a symbol of growing

commercial missions" to the moon, ispace CEO Takeshi Hakamada

told a public viewing event in Tokyo.

Intuitive Machines' ( LUNR ) moon landing last year, albeit

lopsided and partially unsuccessful, marked the first private

company and the first CLPS mission to touchdown on the moon. An

earlier attempt by CLPS member Astrobotic's lander failed

shortly after launch.

Countries and private companies worldwide have been focused

on the moon in recent years for its potential to host astronaut

bases and hold resources that could be mined for in-space

applications, making Earth's natural satellite a stage for

national prestige and geopolitical competition akin to the Cold

War-era space race.

Ispace's ( IPCEF ) lander, named Resilience, is carrying $16 million

worth of customer missions and six payloads in total, including

an in-house "Micro Rover" that will deploy from the lander and

collect lunar samples, said ispace Executive Business Director

Jumpei Nozaki in an interview.

Resilience's touchdown on the moon's surface is expected

four to five months after launch in around May-June. It will

take an energy-efficient path relying heavily on the Earth and

moon's gravity in a winding series of flybys to steer its

trajectory, similar to the Japanese space agency's SLIM which

succeeded in the country's first lunar landing last year.

Firefly's Blue Ghost will aim to reach the moon 45 days

after launch, around March 2. That lander is carrying 10

payloads from a variety of NASA-funded customers and one from

Blue Origin-owned Honeybee Robotics.

Both landers' missions will last a full lunar day, or

roughly two weeks. They will not survive the frigid lunar

nighttime where temperatures can plunge to roughly minus 200

degrees Fahrenheit (minus 128 Celsius).

NASA with its Artemis program aims to return humans to the

moon by 2027 - but likely later - for the first time since 1972,

while China plans to put its own crews on the lunar surface by

2030 following a series of robotic missions.

CLPS missions like Firefly's Blue Ghost, privately owned but

substantially funded by NASA, are meant to study the moon's

surface and stimulate private lunar demand before NASA sends

humans there using SpaceX's Starship and later Blue Origin's

Blue Moon lander.

But the U.S. space agency faces potential changes to its

Artemis program with the incoming administration of Donald

Trump, who as president-elect has largely sided with SpaceX CEO

Elon Musk's vision to focus heavily on Mars.

"We've invested in going to the moon and I think everybody

wants us to go back to the moon," Nicky Fox, head of NASA's

science mission directorate who oversees CLPS, told Reuters on

Tuesday when asked about potential changes to the moon program.

"The great thing about NASA science -- we do amazing science

wherever we go," she said.