A challenge to students home-bound by the global pandemic
Race to the moon! What it would be like? Not only astronauts but now even high school students can answer this rolling-eyes question. Moon Mark, the entertainment and education company that will race on the Moon in 2021 has announced that two teams of high school students in its global Lunar Race Car Design Challenge (LRCDC) created technically valid designs, in just four weeks.
Team Atlas, from Buenos Aires, and Team Ilstar, from Shanghai, submitted designs that met or exceeded the technical specifications needed to race on the Moon. Estimated cost per racer: about $50,000.
“When we issued this last-minute challenge to students home-bound by the global pandemic, our goal was to offer a unique project focused on space commercialization,” said Mary L. Hagy, Founder and CEO of Moon Mark.
These two teams’ accomplishments are beyond praise. They validated 2021 competitors, who actually build the cars that will race. They have what it takes to achieve the defining moment of their generation.
“If the designs could stand up to the rigorous testing required for Moon landing and operations, these two vehicles could be built and raced on the lunar surface,” said Trent Martin, Vice President of Aerospace Systems at Intuitive Machines, Moon Mark’s space partner.
Martin also served as a judge. “The students demonstrated the ingenuity, innovation and problem-solving skills needed to operate in space environments.”
In the LRCDC, issued by Moon Mark in May 2020 for young people home-bound by the pandemic, students were challenged to create a three-minute video, one per week for four weeks. The final video presented the designs for their lunar race cars.
The LRCDC quickly drew 35 teams from 11 countries. The final six, from Argentina, Bolivia, China, Colombia, and the United States, were evaluated by a corps of 25 judges in aerospace, technology, engineering, motorsports, and entrepreneurism, from around the world.
The teams earned prizes of $1,000 each for donation to their charity of choice.
MOON MARK: Our entertainment and education platform creates experiences and content to engage people across Earth and in space, applying science, technology, engineering, arts, and math disciplines to inspire the next generation.
INTUITIVE MACHINES: Our Houston-based company was founded in 2013 by aerospace experts with deep technical knowledge and successes honed over 40 years of human spaceflight and operations.
