The Moon seems to be the perfect terrain for an upcoming car race, right? SpaceX will facilitate Moon Mark and Intuitive Machines’ first-ever car race on The Moon. The companies are teaming up to launch a high school competition to race vehicles on the lunar surface.
The cars will race on the Oceanus Procellarum, a plain near the western edge of The Moon. Formula One race track designer Herman Tilke will be designing the course. Building the vehicles alongside the high school students will be McLaren P1 designer Frank Stephenson.
The press release states that Moon Mark’s Mission 1 competition will include six diverse teams of high school students selected from across the United States, who will compete in a series of qualifying challenges that include unique demands, such as drone and autonomous vehicle racing, e-gaming, and a space commercialization entrepreneurship contest. The two top teams from the qualifying rounds will win a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to build and race two vehicles on the Moon.
The vehicles will be loaded onto Intuitive Machines’ Nova-C Lunar Lander, launched from Earth on SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket. Competitors will then race their rovers remotely, navigating through harsh terrain, racing around a sphere of cameras, which will capture every aspect.
Mission 1 is slated for 2021.
