Britain to launch crowdfunded moon mission
A British-led initiative will launch a publicly funded robotic lander to the moon in 2024.
The Lunar One mission will drill for underground samples of the moon’s crust using a robotic probe. The samples collected will then be analysed to see if a human base could one day be constructed on the moon’s surface.
After #rosetta, #lunarmissionone: a UK-led plan to send a probe to the Moon paid for by the public. pic.twitter.com/54jEn8ohG7
— Pallab Ghosh (@BBCPallab) November 19, 2014
As the first mission of its kind, the £500m required to fund the Lunar One Mission will be raised using predominantly public donations. In return, donors will be allowed digital storage space in time capsules to be buried deep beneath the moon’s crust.
The donors will be able to store songs, messages, pictures, videos and even a strand of their own hair in the capsules. The price for storage space ranges from just a few pounds to send a short message, to around £200 for a compressed video.
Sending a compressed video will cost £200
Leader of the mission David Iron decided to set up the project on crowdfunding website Kickstarter as governments were increasingly finding it difficult to fund space missions. The team aims to raise around £600,000 for the project over the next four weeks.
All funds raised by the project will go to funding the mission. Any money left over will be used as proceeds future space missions.