A group hoping to send a privately funded mission to the Moon will test its lunar rover in the UAE desert.
Part Time Scientists is one of 16 teams hoping to secure $25 million (AED110 million) in funding through Google’s Lunar X-Prize competition to build a vehicle and send it to the Moon.
“We came to the emirates looking for areas that were as dry and as hot as possible as our mission will encounter extreme day-time temperatures as high as 160C,” said Robert Boehme, founder of the Berlin-based company.
The vehicle cost about $750,000 (AED2.75 million), reported The National. It will need to traverse at least half a kilometre of the Moon’s surface to qualify for the prize.
Made largely of aluminium, the 35 kilogram rover has a top speed of 3.6 kilometres an hour and has already been tested in ice caves in the Austrian Alps and on volcanic terrain on the Greek island of Crete but is yet to be tested on soft sand inclines such as those of the Empty Quarter.
Part Time Scientists is now in the final phase of testing its rover and aims to begin its 380,000km journey to the Moon in November 2017. The rover must be able to negotiate a variety of terrains if it is to exploring areas close to the landing site of Nasa’s last manned mission to the Moon, 1972’s Apollo 17, said the report.
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