NASA's VIPER: Exploring the Moon's South Pole for Resources

Wednesday - October 25 2023, 04:13 UTC - 1 year ago

NASA's VIPER mission is set to explore the Moon's South Pole in late 2024, with the aim to assess available resources that may support future human exploration. It is equipped with three instruments and a 3.28-foot drill, enabling it to traverse up to 0.6 miles per day at extreme temperatures. The mission is expected to mark a critical step forward for NASA's Artemis missions and pave the way for a long-term human presence on the Moon.

NASA’s Artemis lunar rover [called VIPER], the Volatiles Investigating Polar Exploration Rover, will explore the South Pole of the Moon in late 2024 on a 100-day mission. It will assess how much water is available and determine how we get and use the Moon’s resources for future human space exploration. Above – An artist’s concept of the completed design of NASA’s Volatiles Investigating Polar Exploration Rover, or VIPER. VIPER will get a close-up view of the location and concentration of ice and other resources at the Moon’s South Pole, bringing us a significant step closer to NASA’s ultimate goal of a long-term presence on the Moon – making it possible to eventually explore Mars and beyond.

NASA VIPER is the first-ever resource mapping mission anywhere other than Earth. The first resource maps of the Moon will mark a critical step forward for NASA’s Artemis missions to establish a long-term presence on the surface of the Moon.Thanks to past moon orbiting missions found the lunar ice. Close analysis is need to learn more about that water. VIPER will roam the Moon using its three instruments and a 3.28-foot (1-meter) drill to detect and analyze various lunar soil environments at a range of depths and temperatures. The rover will venture into permanently shadowed craters, some of the coldest spots in the solar system, where ice reserves have endured for billions of years.There will be three main instruments: .

The Near InfraRed Volatile Spectrometer System instrument, or NIRVSS.The Mass Spectrometer Observing Lunar Operations instrument, or MSOLO.

The Neutron Spectrometer System, or NSS, are all arriving or have arrived at NASA and are getting added to the rover.

The Regolith and Ice Drill for Exploring New Terrains, or TRIDENT, drill system from Honeybee Robotics will be the final instrument to be handed over in the coming weeks, after it finishes VIPER avionics interface testing.

NASA's resources mapping mission, VIPER (Volatiles Investigating Polar Exploration Rover), is set to explore the South Pole of the Moon in late 2024. VIPER is a first-of-its-kind mission that will assess the amount of water available as well as identify and utilize the Moon's resources that could support future human exploration. Equipped with three instruments and a 3.28-foot drill, the rover will gather data from the permanently shadowed craters of the South Pole that is believed to be some of the coldest places in the solar system, where ice reserves have been preserved for billions of years. It has been designed to endure extreme temperatures, with its four 10-inch wheels allowing for about 0.6 miles of traverse per day. The instruments include NIRVSS (Near InfraRed Volatile Spectrometer System), MSOLO (Mass Spectrometer Observing Lunar Operations) and NSS (Neutron Spectrometer System). The TRIDENT drill system from Honeybee Robotics is the final instrument, with its avionics interface testing underway in anticipation of its handover in coming weeks. This mission is set to pave the way for a long-term human presence on the Moon, potentially enabling exploration of Mars and beyond.