Blue Moon Lander Will Take VIPER To Lunar South Pole

NASA announced it has awarded Blue Origin a Commercial Lunar Payload Services (CLPS) task order with an option to deliver its VIPER exploration rover to the South Pole region of the Moon, where it will search for volatile resources such as ice and collect scientific data to support future exploration at the Moon and Mars.

This award calls for Blue Origin to deliver the VIPER, or Volatile Investigating Polar Exploration Rover to the lunar surface in late 2027 as part of NASA’s Artemis campaign.

Sean P. Duffy, acting NASA Administrator said, “NASA is leading the world in exploring more of the Moon than ever before, and this delivery is just one of many ways we’re leveraging U.S. industry to support a long-term American presence on the lunar surface.

“Our rover will explore the extreme environment of the lunar South Pole, traveling to small, permanently shadowed regions to help inform future landing sites for our astronauts and better understand the Moon’s environment – important insights for sustaining humans over longer missions, as America leads our future in space.”

This is the second CLPS lunar delivery awarded to Blue Origin and has a total potential value of $190 million. The company’s first delivery, with its Mark 1 (MK1) robotic lander, is slated for launch later this year to deliver NASA’s Stereo Cameras for Lunar Plume Surface Studies and Laser Retroreflective Array to the lunar South Pole region.

The rover delivery task order is an option at this point because the agency reserves the right to make a final decision on executing that option after reviewing the performance of the base task which is to demonstrate how the lander will off-load the rover to the lunar surface. It will also consider how Blue Origin’s first flight of the Blue Moon MK1 lander performs.

FMI:  www.nasa.gov/