2009 Regolith Excavation Challenge Digs In This Weekend! October 15, 2009
Posted by Nick Azer in : Astrobotic, Google Lunar X Prize, Regolith Excavation Challenge, robotics , trackbackThis weekend (October 17th-18th), 23 teams (including major Google Lunar X PRIZE competitor Astrobotic‘s Moon Diggers team) will be getting down and dirty in the 2009 Regolith Excavation Challenge at NASA Ames in Mountain View, CA (a stone’s throw from my old stomping ground, Santa Clara)!
Lunar regolith (soil) is a key resource in all kinds of ways—-it can be harvested for the all-important helium-3 and, now, water, and could be a valuable construction asset for moon bases. This competition spurs design concepts to maximize the speed and efficiency for these future lunar workhorses.
Check out the video below of an Astrobotic test run, and keep an eye here (and at the official site) for coverage of the results :) :
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Did I ever tell you that in 1992 I was chosen by NASA to participate in their Antarctica Moon Rover Project (can’t remember the actual project name)? I drove their test rover remotely in Antarctica from Mountain View and played in their sandbox there as well. I was chosen because my selection essay was the most compelling…what ever happened to me? Oh, high school!
Yeah, you mentioned that 4th of July weekend I think :) Awesome to see you reading this, haha