NASA, ULA and Astrobotic will launch a commercial robotic lunar mission on January 8 as part of the CLPS and Artemis programs. The Peregrine lunar lander carries NASA payloads designed to advance lunar exploration and will land on the moon on February 23.

Astrobotic's Peregrine lunar lander is encased in the payload fairing, or nose cone, of United Launch Alliance's Vulcan rocket ahead of the launch of NASA's Commercial Lunar Payload Services (CLPS) program on November 21, 2023. The "Peregrine Mission 1" launched by Astrobotic will carry NASA and commercial payloads to the moon in early 2024 to study the lunar outer atmosphere, thermal characteristics, hydrogen abundance of lunar debris, magnetic field, and radiation environment on the lunar surface. Source: United Launch Alliance

As part of NASA's CLPS (Commercial Lunar Payload Services) program and Artemis program, United Launch Alliance (ULA) and Astrobotic will launch the first commercial robot to the lunar surface on Monday, January 8, at 2:18 a.m. ET. ULA's Vulcan rocket and Astrobotic's Peregrine lunar lander will carry NASA's scientific research results and lift off from Launch Complex 41 of the Cape Canaveral Space Station in Florida.

Live coverage of the launch will be available on NASA+, NASA TV, the NASA app and the agency's website, with pre-launch activities beginning on Thursday, January 4. Learn how to watch NASATV on various platforms, including social media. Follow the action online on NASATV.

Peregrine is Astrobotic's small lunar lander. It will fly one of the first commercial lunar missions and be one of the first American spacecraft to land on the moon since the Apollo program. Image source: AstroboticTechnology

The Peregrine Falcon will land on the moon on Friday, February 23. The NASA payloads aboard the lander are designed to help the agency develop the capabilities needed to explore the moon under Artemis and prepare for human missions on the lunar surface.

On Tuesday, November 14, 2023, Astrobotic's team installed a NASA meat ball decal on Astrobotic's Peregrine lunar lander at Astrotech's Space Operations Facility near Kennedy Space Center in Florida. The Peregrine Falcon is scheduled to launch on January 8, 2024, aboard a United Launch Alliance Vulcan rocket from Launch Complex 41 of the Cape Canaveral Space Station in Florida. The lander will carry a suite of NASA payloads to the moon as part of NASA's CLPS (Commercial Lunar Payload Services) program and the Artemis program.

On launch day, the NASA TV media channel will air a "technical feed" showing still footage of the launch pad, but without NASA TV commentary:

https://www.nasa.gov/nasatv

Mission coverage on launch day will be available on NASA's website and will include a live stream and blog updates with a countdown starting no earlier than 1:30 a.m. on January 8. On-demand streaming video and photos of the launch will be available shortly after liftoff. For questions about Countdown coverage, visit the Artemis Blog for the latest updates:

https://blogs.nasa.gov/artemis/

The public can register to attend the launch virtually:

https://www.eventbrite.com/e/nasas-commercial-lunar-payload-services-astrobotic-peregrine-1-launch-registration-525735457907?aff=event

As a virtual guest, you get curated resources, schedule changes, and task-specific information delivered right to your inbox. After each event, the virtual guest will receive a virtual guest passport stamp.

In May 2019, NASA awarded Astrobotic a science payload delivery mission order, which will be one of the first of at least eight planned CLPS deliveries. Through Artemis, NASA is working with multiple CLPS providers to regularly deliver payloads to the moon to conduct scientific surveys, test technologies and demonstrate capabilities to help NASA explore the moon before it sends its first astronauts to land near the lunar south pole.