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, underscoring the global rush to examine the lunar surface.

Tokyo-based company ispace's Resilience lunar lander will launch atop a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket early Wednesday (Jan. 15). Here's what the spacecraft is carrying.

Robotic vehicles from Firefly Aerospace of Texas and Ispace of Japan parted ways early Wednesday after being launched on the same SpaceX rocket. Both are aiming for the lunar surface.