New Lunar Prototype Vehicles Tested (Gallery)

By Nancy Atkinson - June 17, 2008 at 5:55 PM UTC | Space Exploration
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NASA recently took some of its most promising new concepts for living and working on the moon and tried them out in a moon-like location near Lake Moses, Washington. Scout robots, rovers, cargo carriers, cranes and spacesuits endured sand storms and temperature swings to help test out the prototypes and prepare for future lunar expeditions. Although conditions on the moon will be much harsher, one investigator said, "It's as close as we can get in a terrestrial environment to the lunar environment." Above is the Mobile Lunar Transporter, which includes unique features that allow each of its six wheels to move independently, giving the vehicle the ability to drive in any direction. The human drivers stood in turrets on the "trucks."

JPL tested two ATHLETE cargo-moving rovers they are developing. These rather odd-looking transport vehicles have legs capable of rolling or walking over extremely rough or steep terrain. They can carry, manipulate, deposit and transport payloads to desired sites. Maybe they'll become the lunar version of a Winnebago, and future lunar astronauts can also take them out on weekend camping trips.

This Autonomous Drilling Rover could be used to search for valuable resources under the lunar surface in the moon's polar regions. Its made to operate in extreme cold and dark conditions.

This lunar bulldozer, called LANCE (Lunar Attachment Node for Construction Excavation), is designed to be used with the lunar truck. The bulldozer can be used to help prepare a site for building an outpost on the moon.

These K10 scout robots can perform highly repetitive and long-duration tasks. During the tests, the rovers surveyed simulated lunar landing sites and built topographic and panoramic 3-D terrain models. One rover used a ground-penetrating radar to assess subsurface structures. The other used a 3-D scanning laser system known as LIDAR to create topographic maps. They can also perform science reconnaissance.

And of course, we can't have humans on the moon without having spacesuits, so some of the new design of spacesuits were tested as well.

More info about these tests,

which took place on June 2-13, 2008.

Nancy Atkinson

Nancy Atkinson

Nancy Atkinson is a space journalist and author with a passion for telling the stories of people involved in space exploration and astronomy. She is currently retired from daily writing, but worked at Universe Today for 20 years as a writer and editor. She also contributed articles to The Planetary Society, Ad Astra (National Space Society), New Scientist and many other online outlets.

Her 2019 book, "Eight Years to the Moon: The History of the Apollo Missions,” shares the untold stories of engineers and scientists who worked behind the scenes to make the Apollo program so successful, despite the daunting odds against it. Her first book “Incredible Stories From Space: A Behind-the-Scenes Look at the Missions Changing Our View of the Cosmos” (2016) tells the stories of 37 scientists and engineers that work on several current NASA robotic missions to explore the solar system and beyond.

Nancy is also a NASA/JPL Solar System Ambassador, and through this program, she has the opportunity to share her passion of space and astronomy with children and adults through presentations and programs. Nancy's personal website is nancyatkinson.com