via Intuitive Machines, July 21, 2021
Intuitive Machines is building NASA a mini extreme mobility lunar vehicle. Micro-Nova will hop around the Moon’s surface and take the first-ever pictures inside craters on the lunar south pole.
On July 16, 2021, NASA and Intuitive Machines finalized a $41.6 million Tipping Point contract to develop, fly, and operate a deployable “hopper lander” on the Moon. For this mission design, Micro-Nova can carry a 1-kilogram payload of more than 2.5 kilometers to access lunar craters and enable high-resolution surveying of the lunar surface under the flight path.