The lander of Texas-based rocket and spacecraft builder Firefly Aerospace has begun a 45-day trip to the moon.

The spacecraft built and operated by Texas-based Firefly Aerospace launched in the early Monday hours from Florida aboard a SpaceX rocket.

By Joey Roulette and Kantaro Komiya ORLANDO, Florida/TOKYO (Reuters) -Two moon landers, one from Japan's ispace and another from U.S. space firm Firefly, began their journeys into space on Wednesday with SpaceX's unusual double moonshot launch,