Elon Musk and his aerospace company, SpaceX, plan to launch two remote-controlled cars into space for a race on the surface of the moon next year.
Both of these RC vehicles will be sent to the moon in October 2021 aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket. SpaceX has enlisted Frank Stephenson, who is best known for his design work at Ferrari, BMW, McLaren, and more, to design the cars, as reported by Business Insider.
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“This is a project helping to develop the innovators of the future, allowing them to dream big and realize that nothing is impossible,” Stephenson said in a Moon Mark press release. “Space is a fascinating place, remaining untapped for budding designers and I’m very much looking forward to sharing some of my knowledge to those involved in this innovative project.”
Stephenson will design the cars with two teams of high school students. After eight weeks of qualifying challenges by high-schoolers from around the world, six teams of five members will compete to become the final two that race on the Moon, according to Moon Mark, which is a multimedia education company helping to make this race happen. It’s those two teams that will work with Stephenson.
“Their adventures will be captured, produced and globally distributed by Moon Mark,” the company said in a November 17 press release. “The final two teams will complete their racer designs in Houston, Texas, before being loaded onto the lander that will transport them to the Kennedy Space Center, and then to the moon.”
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The two vehicles that the teams and Stephenson have yet to design and build will be carried in a Nova-C lunar lander created by Intuitive Machines aboard the SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket. Intuitive Machines is working with Moon Mark and Lunar Outpost, which is a space technology firm, to bring this off-world idea to life.
“Moon Mark’s mission of getting young people involved in aerospace and working toward utilizing space for the betterment of humanity is something that resonates with us,” Lunar Outpost CEO, Justin Cyrus, said. “We look forward to enabling racers on the Moon and being part of the journey to bring space to the world.”
For more off-world science, read about how the Moon is rusting and then check out possible signs of life on Venus that date back to the 1970s. After that, why not take a look at IGN’s Top 100 sci-fi movies.
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Wesley LeBlanc is a freelance news writer and guide maker for IGN. You can follow him on Twitter @LeBlancWes.
