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NASA Wants Ideas On How To Haul Injured Moonwalkers
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Arthur T Knackerbracket has processed the following story [theregister.com]:
How do you rescue an injured crew member on the lunar surface? NASA is looking for ideas, and a share of a $45,000 prize pot is up for grabs.
The problem [nasa.gov] has vexed the US space agency for some time. Though Apollo featured the Buddy Secondary Life Support System [nasa.gov] (BSLSS) that allowed crew members to share cooling water in the event of a life support system failure while roaming the lunar surface, the problem for Artemis is more complicated. NASA wants a solution to allow the transport of a fully incapacitated crew member back to the lander from a distance of up to two kilometers.
The design must not make use of a lunar rover, must be low in mass (less than 23 kilograms), and must be of minimal volume since it is going to have to be transported by a crew member over the entire duration of extravehicular activity (EVA). It must also be able to deal with the extremes of temperature on the lunar surface and function in the presence of lunar dust.
The design must also be able to handle slopes of up to 20 degrees up or down, as well as the rocks and craters that pepper the lunar surface. On the plus side, it doesn't need to provide any medical attention or life support. It just needs to be something that can be quickly and easily deployed to transport the incapacitated astronaut back to the lander.
It's an interesting mental exercise. How would such a device work? There have been studies [nasa.gov] [PDF] on the subject, which came to the conclusion that a wheeled transport device "provides the highest risk reduction potential," although attaching something like that to an Artemis EVA suit will present a challenge. Other walking assistance options don't meet the "fully incapacitated" requirement [herox.com].
The first crewed landing of the Artemis program is scheduled for not earlier than 2026, meaning that little time remains for a design to be implemented. NASA would like comprehensive technical design concepts, ideally with some preliminary CAD models, submitted by January 23, 2025, and will announce the winners on February 27.
