Commercial Lunar Payload Services is a NASA program to hire companies to send small robotic landers and rovers to the Moon. Most landing sites are near the lunar south pole where they will scout for l
Models of the first three commercial landers selected for the program. Left to right: Peregrine by Astrobotic Technology, Nova-C by Intuitive Machines, and Z-01 by OrbitBeyond.
Nova-C lander model, on display in May 2019 at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland
The lunar south pole region is of special interest because of the occurrence of water ice in permanently shadowed areas inside craters, near constant solar power at the crater rims, and abundant metals and oxygen in the regolith.
Landing sites of the CLPS missions
IM-3
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IM-3 is a robotic spaceflight mission planned by Intuitive Machines for launch in the second half of 2026 for NASA's CLPS program, using a Nova-C lunar lander. It will deliver payloads to the lunar sw
Commercial Lunar Payload Services
…2023–2024 timeframe. Lunar Vertex: a joint lander and rover payload suite slated for delivery to Reiner Gamma to investigate lunar swirls. Assigned to IM-3 lander mission. Applied Physics Laboratory. Farside Seismic Suite (FSS): two seismometers, the vertical Very Broadband seismometer and the Short Period…
IM-1 Odysseus, a Nova-C lander similar to IM-3
CADRE ATLO Team presents completed rovers