Tag: Google Lunar X Prize

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XPRIZE clears Japanese mission to the moon

Team Hakuto rovers
Japan’s Team Hakuto is testing two small rovers known as Tetris (left foreground) and Moonraker (right background). The rovers would ride along with Team Indus’ spacecraft. (Team Hakuto Photo)

The rocketeers on Japan’s Team Hakuto say they’ve gotten the Google Lunar XPRIZE’s seal of approval on its plans for a mission to the moon.

The XPRIZE verification of Team Hakuto’s launch agreement with India’s Team Indus boosts the number of approved competitors to five. That includes Team Indus as well as Moon Express, Synergy Moon and SpaceIL.

“The Google Lunar XPRIZE has always pushed us beyond our limits” Takeshi Hakamada, Team Hakuto’s leader, said in today’s news release. “We will continue to challenge ourselves next year and choose an optimal path to reach the moon.”

Team Hakuto is run by a Tokyo-based startup called ispace, and draws upon expertise from faculty and students at Tohoku University.

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PT Scientists go with Spaceflight for moonshot

Lander and rover
PTScientists’ ALINA lander is designed to carry two Audi Lunar Quattro rovers to the moon’s surface. (PTScientists Photo)

A German team that’s going after the Google Lunar XPRIZE has secured a contract with Seattle-based Spaceflight to get its rover-carrying lander to the moon.

PTScientists, based in Berlin, announced the deal today, and Spaceflight confirmed the partnership. If the contract is verified by the $30 million contest’s organizers at XPRIZE, the group will join three other contestants in the home stretch for the top prize for commercial lunar exploration.

Spaceflight struck a similar deal last year with an Israeli-based GLXP team, SpaceIL. The two other verified teams are Moon Express and Synergy Moon.

There are 16 teams in the GLXP hunt, but they have to have verified launch contracts by the end of this year in order to stay in the competition.

The top prize of $20 million will go to the first team to send a spacecraft to the moon and have it travel more than 500 meters (1,640 feet) while sending back images and video. Other prizes are being offered as extra incentives. If no team gets to the moon by the end of 2017, all those prizes go poof.

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NASA puts out call for lunar experiments

Image: Moon Express lander
An artist’s conception shows a Moon Express lander in lunar orbit. (Credit: Moon Express)

NASA wants suggestions for experiments that can be sent to the moon on commercial spacecraft – and Moon Express, one of the companies building those spacecraft, wants to kick in up to $500,000 per experiment.

The experiments would be aimed at filling the “strategic knowledge gaps” for lunar exploration, NASA said in today’s request for information, which was timed to coincide with this week’s meeting of the Lunar Exploration Analysis Group in Columbia, Md.

The time frame for the proposed experiments – in the range of 2017 to 2020 – seems tailor-made for Moon Express, which is one of several teams going after the top award in the $30 million Google Lunar X Prize.

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Moon Express asks FAA to review lunar mission

An artist’s conception shows the Moon Express MX-1 spacecraft orbiting the moon. (Credit: Moon Express)
An artist’s conce[t shows the Moon Express MX-1 lander orbiting the moon. (Credit: Moon Express)
Moon Express, the lunar exploration venture backed by Seattle tech entrepreneur Naveen Jain, says it’s asking the Federal Aviation Administration to conduct a payload review of its spacecraft and plans for a mission to the moon in 2017.

The request is aimed at heading off regulatory uncertainty about the mission, which is aimed at winning the Google Lunar X Prize.

Moon Express ranks among the front-runners in the $30 million competition, which calls for teams to send landers to the moon, travel along the surface and send back real-time video by the end of next year.

Such a feat would represent a first for commercial space ventures, but because it’s unprecedented, it’s not fully clear what kind of regulatory go-ahead would be required for a U.S.-based company. So far, only governmental space programs have sent probes beyond Earth orbit.

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‘Moon Shot’ focuses on rocketeers’ moon race

Image: "Moon Shot" scene
“Moon Shot” focuses on the rocketeers who are aiming for the moon. (Credit: GLXP)

Film director/producer J.J. Abrams has been in on two of the biggest space-movie franchises ever, “Star Trek” and “Star Wars” – so maybe it shouldn’t be that surprising that he’s also in on “Moon Shot,” an online documentary series that tracks the teams vying for the $30 million Google Lunar X Prize.

Abrams is the executive producer for the Google-backed project announced today. That suggests he wasn’t involved in the day-to-day shooting. But the director of “Moon Shot,” Orlando von Einsiedel, has some top-drawer entries on his resume as well. “Virunga,” his 2014 documentary about conservationists in the battle-torn Democratic Republic of the Congo, has won dozens of awards and was nominated for an Oscar.

The nine-part “Moon Shot” series tells the behind-the-scenes story of the 16 teams that are developing spacecraft for trips to the moon.

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One small step for Moon Express lunar launch

Image: Moon Express in space
An artist’s conception shows Moon Express’ lander on the way to the lunar surface. (Credit: Moon Express)

Moon Express, the lunar exploration venture co-founded by Seattle entrepreneur Naveen Jain, has gotten the “all systems go” signal for its bid to put a robotic lander to the moon and win the Google Lunar XPRIZE.

The thumbs-up comes in the form of XPRIZE’s certification of Moon Express’ launch contract with Los Angeles-based Rocket Lab USA. If all goes according to schedule, Rocket Lab’s Electron launch vehicle will blast off from a pad in New Zealand or the U.S. in 2017, sending Moon Express’ MX-1E lander to the lunar surface.

Next year, Rocket Lab is due to begin Electron test launches from a site on New Zealand’s Mahia Peninsula. The company is also working with Alaska Aerospace Corp., which owns and operates the Pacific Spaceport Complex Alaska on Kodiak Island. In October, Rocket Lab won a $6.95 million NASA contract to launch a payload to low Earth orbit in the 2016-2017 time frame.

The Google Lunar XPRIZE flight would have to go much farther: The rules call for a privately funded lander to touch down on the moon, transport itself at least 500 meters (546 yards) and send video back to Earth. The first team to do all that within the rules wins $20 million. Another $10 million has been set aside for other prizes.

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Moon Express aims for 2017 launch to moon

Image: Richards and MX-1
Moon Express co-founder and CEO Bob Richards shows off a model of the MX-1 lunar lander in 2013. (Credit: Moon Express via YouTube)

Moon Express says it has reserved three lunar lander launches from a startup called Rocket Lab starting in 2017, with an eye toward putting robots on the moon’s surface and winning the lion’s share of the $30 million Google Lunar X Prize.

If the mission is successful, Moon Express could become the first privately backed venture to achieve a soft lunar landing.

“This will be the space equivalent of the four-minute mile,” Moon Express’ co-founder and CEO, Bob Richards, told GeekWire on Thursday. “This is a new era we just could have dreamed about as kids.”

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