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A pair of remote-controlled racing cars will land on the Moon next year for the very first race across the lunar surface – and they will be driven by high school students.
Moon Mark, an entertainment and education company, is sponsoring the race which will see teams of students compete to design and drive one of the two drivers.
The winning teams will then work with McLaren P1 designer Frank Stephenson to create a vehicle that will ride in the low gravity environment of the Moon.
They will be launched to the Moon on a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket in October 2021 and descend to the surface inside the first privately-developed lunar lander.
The winning teams will then work with McLaren P1 designer Frank Stephenson to create a vehicle that will traverse the low gravity environment of the Moon.
After eight weeks of qualification by high school students from around the world, six teams of five members will compete to become the last two to run on the moon.
Those challenges included arcade games, drone races, and an entrepreneurship competition for commercializing space until the final two teams were confirmed.
Their adventures will be captured, produced and distributed worldwide by Moon Mark so people can follow their progress until the October release.
The two pilots will deploy to the Moon via the Nova-C lander by Houston-based Intuitive Machines, following a SpaceX Falcon 9 launch in late 2021.
Final design has not been confirmed as it will be a collaboration between Moon Mark, Frank Stephenson and the winning teams of high school students
It’s a heavy load going to the lunar surface – each car will weigh 5.5 lbs and the lander to bring them to the surface will weigh another 6.6 lbs – a total of 17.6 lbs.
Although the cost of the launch has not been revealed – other companies are citing $ 544,000 a pound to send objects to the moon – a cost of nearly $ 10 million.
The Nova-C lander is the “first fully privately-developed lunar lander” and is expected to land in the Oceanus Procellarum.
The lander will travel to the Moon next year to study the large canyon-sized Schröter Valley, but will deploy the pair of racing cars at the same time.
The final two teams of students will complete the runners’ designs in Houston, Texas, before being loaded onto the lander that will transport them to the moon.
Moon Mark works with a number of private space companies, including Lunar Outpost, which have expertise in the development of lunar rover vehicles.
“We couldn’t be happier to partner with Lunar Outpost, the industry leader in aerospace mobility,” said Mary Hagy, Founder and CEO of Moon Mark.
“Their expertise in developing lunar rovers ensures that our racing teams will have the technical knowledge necessary to accomplish the mission and leave a scientific legacy after the waves of the checkered flag.
Lunar Outpost will adapt its patented Mobile Autonomous Prospecting Platform (MAPP), created for extraterrestrial science missions, for racing mobility.
Moon Mark, an entertainment and education company, is sponsoring the race which will see teams of students compete to design and drive one of the two drivers.
“Moon Mark’s mission to engage young people in aerospace and work to use space for the betterment of humanity is something that resonates with us,” said Justin Cyrus , co-founder and CEO of Lunar Outpost.
“We look forward to enabling runners on the Moon and being part of the journey to bring space to the world.
Once on the lunar surface, competitors will race their rovers from a distance, navigating difficult terrain, traversing a sphere of cameras capturing every aspect.
“We don’t anticipate any significant communication delays affecting racing or driving,” said Todd Wallach, CTO of Moon Mark.
“We will have visuals, telemetry and near real-time command and control thanks to our partnership with Intuitive Machines.
“ Runners built by Lunar Outpost will connect to the intuitive Lander machines via WiFi, and the Lander will send and receive telemetry data, commands and controls to and from Earth to drive runners. ”
The final track and layout on the Moon has not been confirmed by Moon Mark’s team, but they are designed by Hermann Tilke – who designed all recent Formula 1 tracks around the world.
“He designs this lunar circuit. They know the lunar surface, it’s been scanned to the point where it has enough information to develop this track, ”said Frank Stephenson, who has final say on vehicle design.
If the Nova-C lander successfully hits the moon, it will be the first private spacecraft to do so – and one of the few successful projects.
So far, only the United States, China and Russia have made a successful soft landing on the lunar surface – others have tried, including India – but the missions have failed to land in all security or have been lost.
Assuming Nova-C lands safely, not only will this be the first run to the surface of the Moon, but it will also be the first private landing – potentially the spearhead of a new commercial moon race.
The Moon is back in the world news as China sent a mission to bring back rock samples from the lunar surface – which is expected to return in December, and the United States has sent the first woman and the next man to the surface by 2024.
NASA to land the first woman and the next man on the moon in 2024 as part of the Artemis mission
Artemis was the twin sister of Apollo and the Moon Goddess in Greek mythology.
NASA chose her to personify her path to the Moon, which will see astronauts return to the lunar surface by 2024 – including the first woman and the next man.
Artemis 1, formerly Exploration Mission-1, is the first in a series of increasingly complex missions that will enable human exploration of the Moon and Mars.
Artemis 1 will be the first integrated flight test of NASA’s deep space exploration system: the Orion spacecraft, the Space Launch System (SLS) rocket and ground systems at the Kennedy Space Center at Cape Canaveral, in Florida.
Artemis 1 will be an unmanned flight that will provide a basis for human exploration of deep space and demonstrate our commitment and ability to extend human existence to the Moon and beyond.
During this flight, the spacecraft will launch onto the world’s most powerful rocket and fly farther than any human-built spacecraft has ever flown.
It will travel 280,000 miles (450,600 km) from Earth, thousands of miles beyond the Moon in a mission of about three weeks.
Artemis 1, formerly Exploration Mission-1, is the first in a series of increasingly complex missions that will enable human exploration of the Moon and Mars. This graphic explains the different stages of the mission
Orion will stay in space longer than any astronaut ship has without docking at a space station and will return home faster and hotter than ever.
With this first exploration mission, NASA is leading the next steps in human exploration into deep space where astronauts will build and begin testing near-moon systems needed for lunar surface missions and exploration to other destinations further from Earth, including Mars.
He will take the crew on a different trajectory and test Orion’s critical systems with humans on board.
The SLS rocket will go from an initial configuration capable of sending more than 26 metric tons to the moon, to a final configuration capable of sending at least 45 metric tons.
Together, Orion, SLS and Kennedy’s ground systems will be able to meet the most difficult needs of aircrew and deep space cargo missions.
Ultimately, NASA seeks to establish a lasting human presence on the Moon by 2028 following the Artemis mission.
The space agency hopes this colony will uncover new scientific discoveries, demonstrate new technological advancements and lay the groundwork for private companies to build a lunar economy.
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