Lunar Mission One - 6 days left to be a part of it!

If you haven't heard about Lunar Mission One yet, I'd suggest you check out the Kickstarter Project currently in progress. There are only 6 days left for the project's fundraising phase and your chance to be part of an actual space mission to the Moon.

Disclaimer: I'm in no way affiliated with the project, I only backed them because I find the topic very interesting and inspiring. I'm not posting this to beg for money or anything, just bringing this to your attention.

Lunar Mission One is an initiative to send an unmanned robotic landing module to the South Pole of the Moon – an area unexplored by previous missions, and drill down to a depth of at least 20 meter, if possible to 100 meter. This is of course a very ambitious enterprise, but the people behind it seem to know what they are talking about.

An upper stage will boost the spacecraft – which will also act as the lunar lander and drilling platform – towards the Moon.The craft will slow down into orbit around the lunar poles, and adjust its orbit for a precision landing.

From the viewing gallery at mission control, members of the Lunar Missions Club will be able to watch as the spacecraft slows itself down again to head towards its preselected landing site near the South Pole, checks its position with reference to the target area and adjusts its trajectory as required.

In the last minute before landing, as it slows itself for the last time, it will look for any small hazards and make final adjustments. The engines will cut out just before the moment of landing and the legs of the craft will absorb the residual momentum, stabilising and settling the craft on the surface of the Moon.

And then the drilling will begin. With a 2 metre drill connected to the spacecraft by a cable, we will drill a 5cm diameter borehole. As the drilling progresses, the equipment will retrieve cylindrical rock cores for analysis by a suite of scientific instruments onboard the spacecraft.

Drilling will continue for three to four months until we reach at least our target depth of 20m – but possibly as deep as 100m. Once the final samples are retrieved, the spacecraft will lower into place the time capsule containing the public and private archives and plug the borehole.

Depending on the mission’s success, we would arrange a return mission to bring the most important samples back for more detailed analysis on Earth. This would be the next mission funded by the Lunar Missions Trust.

Although the project will take many years to develop and it may not even be likely it will ever succeed, I like to think that it will and that some day in the not so distant future a module will land on the Moon to perform some awesome research that I personally helped to achieve.

More information about the project can be found at www.lunarmissionone.com... or the link at the top.

a reply to: RationalDespair

Yeah, it's not doing that. Something mysterious will happen, as per.

If I donated, would my name go onto a plaque or something that will be attached to the module? Along with everyone else who donated?

That would be awesome!


EDIT:


Never mind, I just read it, and I have donated too. Awesome find OP thank you!

H3 could be the energy of the future and it is widely available there. Better than nuclear and cleaner. But oil companies have too much power. That wont happen until they can monopolize on it. Helium-3 (He-3) is a light, non-radioactive isotope of helium with two protons and one neutron. It is rare on Earth, and it is sought for use in nuclear fusion research.

www.explainingthefuture.com...

I know about the big oil companies and other powers at work that may not like this particular project to become reality. That's why I stated my doubt in the OP whether this project will ever take off or not (pun intended).

This really makes me think though. If some enthusiasts can seemingly fund a project like this for a couple of million pounds, then it should not be so hard to figure out there must already be some modules sent up there by companies for whom a few million is pocket change...

Any how, I'd really like to see an honest and transparent scientific mission to the moon and that's why I support this. Secretly, I just hope they will encounter a massive metal shell through which they can't drill, yet they'll be able to prove once and for all that the moon is a hollow artificial shell. Call me nuts, but for me that's still the most plausible theory for why the moon is there in the first place. But I digress...

good luck to them, and you, however financial constraints place such a venture beyond my remit.

It'll certainly be a once in a lifetime experience if it ever gets off the ground!