Pictures and Narrative By Jim Campbell and Sarah Curtiss

Due to ANN E-I-C Jim Campbell's close relationship with the X Prize Foundation, and our continuing interest in all things that push the frontiers of aviation and aerospace, ANN had the coveted opportunity to be a part of some of the most exciting events in recent aerospace history... and this week's announcement of the next step in the X Prize program was certainly a good time for us to be involved once again. ANN was there... as part of the X Prize news and video team... not only for the event itself, but for many of the carefully orchestrated rehearsals, and some of the intensive planning sessions that tied in some of the media planning for the public announcement.

Here's a little bit of what we saw and experienced this amazing week, as hosted at the LA Convention Center...

X Prize Boss Peter Diamandis announces the Google Lunar X PRIZE, a robotic race to the Moon to win a remarkable $30 million prize purse.  Private companies from around the world will compete to land a privately funded robotic rover on the Moon that is capable of completing several mission objectives, including roaming the lunar surface for at least 500 meters and sending video, images and data back to the Earth.

Google's Larry Page talks about his work with the X Prize Foundation. The Google Lunar X PRIZE is an unprecedented international competition that will challenge and inspire engineers and entrepreneurs from around the world to develop low-cost methods of robotic space exploration. The X PRIZE Foundation, best known for the $10 million Ansari X PRIZE for private suborbital spaceflight, is an educational nonprofit prize organization whose goal is to bring about radical breakthroughs to solve some of the greatest challenges facing the world today.

Hollywood Producer and X Prize Board member Robert Weiss spoke passionately about his interest in seeing private space efforts contionue and expand. Moon 2.0, the second era of lunar exploration, will not be a quest for "flags and footprints." This time, the intention is to go to the Moon to stay. 'The Moon is a stepping stone to the rest of the solar system and a source of solutions to some of the most pressing environmental problems that we face on Earth - energy independence and climate change.  Already, governments from around the world recognize the importance of lunar exploration, and national space agencies from the United States, Russia, China, India, Japan, and the nations of Europe plan to send probes to the Moon in the coming decade.'

To win the Google Lunar X PRIZE, a team must successfully land a privately funded craft on the lunar surface and survive long enough to complete the mission goals of roaming about the lunar surface for at least 500 meters and sending a defined data package, called a "Mooncast," back to Earth.

Apollo 11 Astronaut, Dr. Buzz Aldrin, has been a tireless advocate for private space exploration and a true firend to the X Prize effort. A $20 million Grand Prize will be awarded to the team that can soft land a craft on the Moon that roams for at least 500 meters and transmits a Mooncast back to Earth. The Grand Prize is $20 million until December 31st, 2012; thereafter it will drop to $15 million until December 31st 2014, at which point the competition will be terminated unless extended by Google and the X PRIZE Foundation.

A $5 million Second Prize will be offered as well, providing an extra incentive for teams to continue to compete, and increasing the possibility that multiple teams will succeed.  Second place will be available until December 31st, 2014 at which point the competition will be terminated unless extended by Google and the X PRIZE Foundation.
An additional $5 million in bonus prizes can be won by successfully completing  additional mission tasks such as roving longer distances (> 5,000 meters), imaging man made artifacts (e.g. Apollo hardware), discovering water ice, and/or surviving through a frigid lunar night (approximately 14.5 Earth days). The competing lunar spacecraft will be equipped with high-definition video and still cameras, and will send images and data to Earth, which the public will be able to view on the Google Lunar X PRIZE website.

In a recent Gallup poll, more than two-thirds of Americans (68%) support a return to the Moon, and further missions to points beyond. Some practical benefits to lunar exploration include:

• Enabling exploration of the solar system and beyond. Space exploration is expensive because every ounce of propellant and spacecraft must be launched out of the Earth's strong gravity field. A natural storehouse of materials, lunar soil is more than 40% oxygen by weight and oxygen makes up most of the mass of rocket propellant. Because of its shallower gravity well, the Moon is the stepping stone to the universe.
• The Moon can help save the Earth. For more than 30 years, NASA and the US Department of Energy have experimented with ways to capture abundant clean solar energy in space for use on Earth. Although the technology for doing this is well understood, the high cost of launching materials out of the Earth's deep gravity well has prevented the implementation of these systems. However, if lunar material is used for space construction, clean energy could be supplied on a 24-hour basis without carbon dioxide or other hazards to the biosphere.
• We can learn about the Earth's geologic past. Thanks to the Moon rocks and other information returned by Apollo astronauts, scientists now believe that the Moon was created by a collision between a planet-sized object and the early Earth. By exploring our nearest neighbor we are also exploring a remnant of ancient Earth.
• We can see more deeply into space. The Moon provides a large stable platform for astronomical observation unhindered by atmosphere. The far side of the Moon is the one "quiet" place in the Solar System that is shielded from the Earth's cacophony of radio, television and data broadcasts. The body of the Moon itself provides this shielding, and a radio telescope on the lunar far side can detect energy from the beginning of the universe.
• Driving new technologies and devices. The Moon may be the most hostile environment we face in the near future. Surviving and exploring will require major advances in technology. Many of those technologies will also have practical use back home.

NASA Deputy Administrator Shana Dale spoke in support of this amazing program. The rules of the Google Lunar X PRIZE require that all teams be at least 90% privately funded, which will prevent NASA from directly entering into the competition. As such, NASA's main role in the Google Lunar X PRIZE will be as a direct beneficiary. It is expected that the advancements made by the teams pursing the Google Lunar X PRIZE will allow NASA to save money and expand the capabilities of its future robotic and human missions to the Moon.   

Teams will be required to send a Mooncast detailing their arrival on the lunar surface, and a second Mooncast that provides imagery and video of their journey roaming the lunar surface. All told, the Mooncasts will represent approximately a Gigabyte of stunning content returned to the Earth.

The required Mooncast consists of digital data that must be collected and transmitted to the Earth composed of the following:

• High resolution 360º panoramic photographs taken on the surface of the Moon;
• Self portraits of the rover taken on the surface of the Moon;
• Near-real time videos showing the craft's journey along the lunar surface;
• High Definition (HD) video;
• Transmission of a cached set of data, loaded on the craft before launch (e.g. first email from the Moon).

Peter Diamandis and Apollo 11 Astronaut Buzz Aldrin: "The Google Lunar X PRIZE calls on entrepreneurs, engineers and visionaries from around the world to return us to the lunar surface and explore this environment for the benefit of all humanity," said Peter. "We are confident that teams from around the world will help develop new robotic and virtual presence technology, which will dramatically reduce the cost of space exploration."

Media interest was considerable... with the story ultimately published to a worldwide audience. ANN and Aero-TV fulfilled a number of functions in support of the X Prize announcement, providing still and video teams to help document the event for posterity.

Buzz Aldrin, inextricably linked to a sterling moment in space history, now has positioned himslef solidly in support of a new future for spaceflight and our "neighbor," the Moon. Earth's offshore island, the Moon, provides a natural storehouse of resources that we can use to enhance life on Earth and explore our universe. By using energy and material resources from outside the Earth's biosphere and gravity "well," we can take positive steps towards solving seemingly intractable problems on Earth.

The X PRIZE Foundation is an educational nonprofit prize institute whose mission is to create radical breakthroughs for the benefit of humanity. The Google Lunar X PRIZE is the third prize the Foundation has announced since its inception in 1995. In 2004, the X PRIZE Foundation captured world headlines when Mojave Aerospace Ventures, led by legendary aircraft designer Burt Rutan and Microsoft cofounder Paul Allen, built and flew the world's first private spaceship to win the $10 million Ansari X PRIZE. The Foundation has since expanded its mission beyond space exploration. In 2006, the X PRIZE Foundation launched the Archon X PRIZE for Genomics, a $10 million competition in which the winning team will demonstrate the ability to sequence 100 human genomes in 10 days. This will reduce the cost of genome sequencing and herald a new era of personalized medicine. The X PRIZE Foundation will continue to offer new prizes for breakthroughs in the areas of life improvement, equity of opportunity and sustainability and is widely recognized as the leading model for fostering innovation through competition.

ANN is thrilled to be covering another milestone for the talented team that supports the mission of the X Prize. We'll have more info to come on this program in the near future, as well as an Aero-TV Special Feature next week, during NBAA2007.

FMI: www.googlelunarxprize.org