Rover

NASA Moon rover

Helios Mars rover

A **rover** in space exploration, also called **roving vehicle**, is a vehicle designed to move around on the surface of the Moon or on another planet. Rovers must be designed to withstand the harsh environmental circumstances of the specific celestial body they are meant to be used on. They must be very robust, have the ability to drive around or pass over obstacles in their way, and cope with extreme fluctuations in temperature and the corrosiveness and grittiness of the type of regolith, sands and stones of the astronomical body. They can either be built for human transport, be partially or fully autonomous, or remotely controlled. Therefore, they can be of various different shapes and sizes.

## Moon rover

### NASA

Rovers were used on the Moon by the Americans for both human transportation and materials handling. They were sent to the Moon during the early exploration days already, first time with Apollo 15 in 1971.  The rovers could carry 2 astronauts and their equipment.

By 1994, NASA had at least 7 functional rovers on the Moon, presumably even more.

#### Gallery

Training roverTraining rover1st rover on the Moon in 1971Rover used as cable winchMoon rover in 1974Moon rover at the Shackleton craterMoon rover in 1983Several Moon rovers in convoy in 1983Jamestown 1994 with 7 visible rovers
### Soviet Space Program

The Soviets also used rovers with their Zvezda lunar base. They used 6-wheel crawler type vehicles for transporting humans and cargo.

#### Gallery

Soviet rover near the Shackleton crater, 1974Soviet rover parked in front of Jamestown, 1983
## Mars rover

### Uncrewed vehicles

Several different rovers have been sent to Mars before the first crewed landing. These were partially autonomous and remotely controlled vehicles in various sizes and with different scientific tasks.

The first rover on Mars was sent there in 1975 by NASA and was called *Sojourner*, same as the crewed mission and its spaceship *Sojourner 1* 20 years later. It was brought there by the *Hermes* probe, which launched in 1974 and landed sucessfully 11 month later in Ares Vallis. It made the first ever images of the Martian surface and sent them back to Earth. Several earlier attempts by both NASA and the Soviet Space Program had failed, including the US *Viking* and the USSR *Mars* landers. *Hermes* used airbagsW originally developed by the automobile industry to touch the Martian ground undamaged.

During later missions, several more rovers were sent to Mars to various locations, like the Spirit and Opportunity rovers.

#### Gallery

First Mars rover, 1975*Hermes* deploying its Mars roverMars rover *Sojourner**Hermes* lander with airbags
Exploration rover *Spirit* patchRover *Opportunity* patch
### Crewed vehicles

For their Mars missions in 1995, both NASA and Helios Aerospace had several rovers sent to the planet's surface. It is unknown, if the Soviets had brought rovers with their *Mars-94* spacecraft too, as their mission failed already during the trip to the red planet.

#### NASA

The US Sojourner mission had a crawler type rover and two 4-wheel vehicles, all sent to the Martian surface by a support mission launched one year before in 1993. Other than their lunar rovers, these vehicles all have pressurized cabins, allowing for longer trips without the need to wear a spacesuit all the time.

##### Gallery

NASA crewed Mars roverHappy Valley base with two rovers parkedCrawler type rover used to assemble the habitat modulesInside the NASA roverInside the NASA roverAll NASA rovers in useThe two 4-weel roversThe crawler type rover in use
#### Helios

Helios used two huge 6-wheel rovers that also served as mobile habitats for the crew. Additionally, at least one crawler type vehicle was sent to the ground, used for their drilling rig on the search for water. They were all sent to the surface by one-way landing pods.

Although not designed for so many people, after the disastrous landslide the remaining HAB rover was able to accommodate 10 persons.

As Happy Valley base continued to be built up, Helios provided more rovers to be used by the inhabitants. This included a type of wheeled rover with docking ports on the top and back, to be used in transporting people from Hopper landers to the base.

##### Gallery

Helios rover unloadingHelios rover unloadingThe Helios base with their 2 mobile habitat roversHAB1 & HAB2Helios habitat rover close-upWorking in front of roverInside HAB roverInside HAB roverHelios drill roverHelios drill rover schematicHAB 1 after the Mars landslideHAB 2 docked to Happy Valley baseRover used to transport inhabitants of Happy Valley Base circa 2003
## Behind the scenes

1. ↑ In reality, NASA used the lunar roving vehiclesW in their last 3 missions (Apollo 15, 16, 17) during 1971 and 1972.
2. ↑ In the real timeline, the first NASA rover arrived on Mars in 1997 only, with the *Pathfinder*W mission.

## External links

* Rover (space exploration) on Wikipedia
* Lunar rover on Wikipedia
* Apollo rovers on Wikipedia
* Mars rover on Wikipedia
* List of rovers on extraterrestrial bodies on Wikipedia

## References

1. ↑ *For All Mankind* TV Series - Season 1, Episode 5: "Into the Abyss"
2. ↑ *For All Mankind* TV Series - Season 3, Episode 3: "All In"
3. ↑ Bonus Video: One Giant Leap: 1975-1982 - Mars Landing (1975)
4. ↑ 4.0 4.1 4.2 *For All Mankind* TV Series - Season 3