Building a base on the Moon is not only about landers and habitats. Astronauts and robots will need a way to get around, and on Tuesday, October 20, NASA shared a fresh look at the vehicles that will do that job.

In a new Moon Base video update, the agency outlined progress on both robotic rovers and the crewed lunar terrain vehicles that are central to its plans for humanity’s first lunar outpost.

“Lunar rovers are central to our surface mobility strategy,” said Robert Pickle, director of the Surface Mobility Office within NASA’s Moon Base Program. He added that their performance will “lay the groundwork for the mobility systems that will define the next era of exploration.”

VIPER: hunting for water in the dark

The first rover in the spotlight is VIPER, short for Volatiles Investigating Polar Exploration Rover. According to NASA, VIPER will head to the lunar South Pole region in 2027 to explore permanently shadowed craters in search of water and other resources.

A few key details from NASA’s update:

  • VIPER will be delivered to the surface by a Blue Origin Blue Moon Mark 1 lander.
  • Once there, it will travel more than 18 miles (30 kilometers).
  • It will gather information about temperatures, lighting and terrain in the South Pole region.
  • The rover is fully built and undergoing final testing at NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston before heading to Kennedy Space Center in Florida for launch.

Mission operations will be run from NASA’s Ames Research Center in Silicon Valley, where teams are already simulating scenarios the rover could face on the Moon.

Why water matters so much

Water ice in shadowed craters is one of the most valuable things a Moon Base could find. It could one day be used for drinking water, breathable oxygen or even rocket propellant, which would mean less has to be launched from Earth.

NASA says VIPER’s data could help reveal how water is distributed on the Moon and where it came from, help decide how lunar resources might be used for the base, and improve our understanding of the history of the Moon and Earth.

Lunar terrain vehicles: robots first, then astronauts

The second part of the update covers the lunar terrain vehicles, or LTVs. These are the rovers astronauts will eventually drive.

NASA has awarded Astrolab and Lunar Outpost task orders to build the first phase of Moon Base rovers capable of carrying crew. Blue Origin has a separate task order to deliver the LTVs to the South Pole region by 2028 through NASA’s Commercial Lunar Payload Services initiative.

The clever part is that the LTVs will not sit idle before crews arrive. NASA says they will be remotely operated from Earth, driving up to 3.7 miles (6 kilometers) a day and mapping the surface to help scientists build high-resolution maps before astronauts land.

Testing in extreme cold

Those early drives will also be a crash course in survival. The South Pole region includes permanently shadowed areas where temperatures can drop to minus 334 degrees Fahrenheit (minus 203 Celsius), according to NASA.

The agency wants to learn how well the vehicles navigate, how they handle lighting conditions and how efficiently they conserve energy when driving in and out of those frigid shadows. Lessons from those trips will feed into future vehicles, hardware and infrastructure for the base.

Later, Artemis astronauts will drive the LTVs to explore and conduct science across the region.

How it fits the bigger picture

NASA’s Moon Base effort is about staying, not just visiting. Rovers act as scouts, cargo carriers and science platforms, and the data they collect will shape where habitats go and how crews move between them. In the same week, NASA also shared progress on other future exploration projects, a reminder that many pieces are moving at once.

The bottom line

VIPER is built and nearly ready to ship to the launch site, and the first crew-capable rovers are on track to be scouting the South Pole before astronauts arrive. If all goes to plan, the Moon’s first neighborhood will be mapped by robots long before people move in.

Image: Hakuto rover model by Syced via Wikimedia Commons, CC0 1.0