A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket launched the Intuitive Machines IM-2 mission to a lunar transfer orbit from Launch Complex 39A (LC-39A) at Kennedy Space Center at 7:16 p.m. on 26 February 2025. Also on board this mission is NASA's Lunar Trailblazer, Astroforge’s Odin, and Epic Aerospace’s CHIMERA GEO 1 spacecraft.

Following stage separation, Falcon 9's first stage landed on the A Shortfall of Gravitas droneship stationed in the Atlantic Ocean.

This was the ninth flight of the first stage booster supporting this mission, which previously launched Crew-8, Polaris Dawn, CRS-31, Astranis: From One to Many, and four Starlink missions.

Intuitive Machines’ IM-2 mission represents a significant leap forward in lunar exploration, ready to demonstrate water hunting infrastructure services on the Moon’s surface. IM-2 is set to demonstrate lunar mobility, resource prospecting, and analysis of volatile substances from subsurface materials, a critical step toward uncovering water sources beyond Earth—a key component for establishing sustainable infrastructure both on the lunar surface and in space.

Rideshare Payloads

LUNAR TRAILBLAZER
NASA JET PROPULSION LAB CALIFORNIA INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY
Selected by NASA’s Small Innovative Missions for Planetary Exploration (SIMPLEx) program in 2019, Lunar Trailblazer will map the distribution of the different forms of water that exist on the surface of the Moon.

ODIN
ASTROFORGE
AstroForge, the ambitious three-year-old startup out of LA, is over the Moon about the upcoming launch of its spacecraft, Odin. Odin is poised to become the first privately funded commercial vehicle to venture into deep space. In November 2024, AstroForge was awarded the first- ever FCC commercial license for operating and communicating with a spacecraft in deep space. AstroForge aims to gather high-resolution imagery of a target near-Earth asteroid—the first step in establishing a cost-effective, repeatable playbook for turning deep space into the next frontier for resource extraction and exploration.

CHIMERA
EPIC AEROSPACE
Chimera is a unique vehicle family with a common propulsion system, based around the densest and highest specific impulse non-toxic propellants, simple ACS and propellant management devices, and easy-to-build structures that can accommodate a multitude of payloads and avionics configurations.