US firm Firefly Aerospace achieved its first successful moon landing with the Blue Ghost spacecraft today, touching down near Mare Crisium. The uncrewed lander, carrying 10 scientific payloads, marks Firefly as the second private company to land on the moon, following Intuitive Machines’ partial success last year. The spacecraft travelled 2.8 million miles over three loops around Earth before landing, beginning a 14-day research mission powered by solar panels.

This milestone is part of the growing private sector competition in space exploration, with NASA’s over 100 million dollar contract supporting Firefly’s efforts under the Commercial Lunar Payload Services (CLPS) program. The mission precedes the U.S. plans to send astronauts to the moon by 2027. Five nations have made successful soft landings in the past—the then-Soviet Union, the U.S., China, India, and, last year, Japan.