Lunar autoIn 1971, Dave Scott became the first person to drive a vehicle on the Moon - the battery-powered Lunar Rover (LRV) - as part of the Apollo 15 mission to the mountainous Hadley-Apennine region. This LRV, the first to be carried on an Apollo mission, built by Boeing, weighed 460 lb (209 kg) and folded into a space 5 ft by 20 in (1.5 m by 0.5 m). Each wheel was independently driven by ¼ horsepower (200 W) electric motor. The astronauts could travel further from their landing site and sample a wider variety of lunar materials. The car travelled 17.4 miles (28 km) and collected about 168 pounds (76 kg) of lunar materials to return to Earth. Shepard and Mitchell of the previous Apollo 14 mission walked about 2.5 miles (4 km), hauling their scientific gear in a two-wheeled cart .«[Image: Lunar Rover Vehicle driven by Dave Scott in the first lunar surface extravehicular activity at the Hadley-Apennine landing site.] |
