Firefly Aerospace's Blue Ghost moon lander on course for descent to touchdown Sunday

Firefly Aerospace's Blue Ghost lander closed in on the moon Saturday, on course for a nail-biting automated descent to touchdown early Sunday, the first of three private-sector robotic moon landers to reach its target after launches earlier this year.

The Blue Ghost lunar lander spent a month orbiting Earth after launch atop a Falcon 9 rocket in January, giving Firefly flight controllers in Austin, Texas, plenty of time to activate and test its systems and science payloads before heading to the moon.

Once there, the spacecraft spent 16 days in lunar orbit refining its trajectory and beaming back spectacular views of Earth from 240,000 miles away.