Manned rovers and unmanned robotic rovers have dramatically increased our knowledge of the Moon and Mars over the last 40 years. The first rover to be employed on another planetary body was the Soviet Lunokhod 1 unmanned rover that was soft-landed on the Moon in 1970.  The United States was already designing a manned Lunar Roving Vehicle (LRV) to be used for the first time on Apollo 15, and later on Apollo 16 and then Apollo 17--the last manned mission to the Moon in the 20th century.  Before the end of that century, the United States would successfully land the first rover on Mars, known as Pathfinder/Sojourner. The Sojourner micro-rover paved the way for two larger and more sophisticated Mars Exploration Rovers (MERs) known as Spirit and Opportunity.  In the coming years, an even larger Mars Scientific Laboratory (MSL) will land on Mars and provide even more detailed scientific data on the planet Mars and video as well as high resolution photography to be beamed back to Earth.

In the next decade, the United States will return to the Moon as part of Project Constellation. The crews that return there will employ a second generation LRV and will even be accompanied by small autonomous robotic assistants to aid the crews while on the Moon. Manned lunar rovers proved their worth during the Apollo J-missions, and work is already underway at several NASA centers evaluating technologies that will be employed on future manned and unmanned rovers when American astronauts return to the Moon.

On this site you will be able to learn more about these rovers and see many photos never before published on the world wide web. Be sure to also check out the links page for even more information on these amazing machines designed for distant worlds.

Anthony Young, webmaster