NASA's VIPER rover is a water-hunting robot that will explore the Moon's South Pole as it collects ice samples, all while being remotely navigated from the Ames Research Center in Silicon Valley. Here's how they're preparing on Earth.
"I think one of the great values of the egress testing is we spend half of the time in the high bay with the hardware operating it from the desk behind me and watching what happens," Deans said. "And then half the time we spend in another building across the campus is where all we have is our remote control displays and remote control command abilities and we try to understand what's happening to the vehicle without being near it.
Deans said there are a range of conditions to expect but they won't know until they land on the Moon and drive on the surface. "Sometimes the sun goes down on the Moon and we'll have to park the rover - put it in a hibernation mode and hope it stays warm enough to survive turn back on when the sun comes back up," Deans said."The idea that we're going to the South Pole of the Moon, we're going to find out what's there it's just part of what we're doing in space," Lofgren said. "We're going to go to asteroids, we're going to go to Mars.
Astrobotic's Marketing Director Alivia Chapla said the final flight build is being built in Pittsburg, Pennsylvania. "The final flight build actually has two ramps on either side of Griffin so VIPER can see which ramp it might egress or exit safely off of once it gets to the lunar service," Chapla said.VIPER will remain on the Moon and will have around six months of operations.
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