New Delhi:
TeamIndus, a Bengaluru-based space start-up, has offered an opportunity to Indians get their name plate on the Moon. But this opportunity comes for a price. If you wish to leave your name on the lunar surface, you will have to pay Rs 500, which isn’t a big amount.
TeamIndus has invited names of the public ‘donors’ which they will get micro-engraved on a small-sized aluminium object. This name plate will then be placed on the surface of the Moon when its lander descends on the Moon. The mission is planned for December 28, 2017.
The PSLV rocket will travel 3.84 lakh kilometres from Earth and will make a soft landing on the Moon on January 26, 2018. The robotic rover of the mission will beam back photos and videos.Sheelika Ravishankar, Jedi Master - Marketing and Outreach, of the Bengaluru-based start-up said that the name plate plan is a part of the crowd-funding effort.
“In the future, when people start travelling to the moon, who knows, they may find this box and spot the names of their ancestors,” Ms. Ravishankar told The Hindu.
Around 10,000 people have sent in their names.
About Google's Lunar XPRIZE and TeamIndus:
It is yet to be seen who will win Google's Lunar XPRIZE worth USD 25 million in the race to reach the moon. In a display of sportsmanship, India's TeamIndus will carry the rover of rival Hakuto on its own spacecraft where they will compete for the prize.
The privately funded teams are required to land their spacecrafts on the moon, travel 500 metres and broadcast a high definition video and images and send the data back to Earth in order to win the Googles Lunar XPRIZE.
The TeamIndus spacecraft will carry its own indigenously designed and developed robotic rover, ECA - short for 'Ek Chhoti si Asha' (one small wish) and will also take along the Japanese Rover.
TeamIndus had recently signed a commercial launch contract with Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) for the moon mission.
The spacecraft will be launched by TeamIndus aboard ISRO's PSLV rocket that will put the spacecraft into an orbit 800 km above the surface of the earth.
From there the spacecraft will set course to the moon by switching on its own engines. Both the rovers would be deployed after landing on the lunar surface on Mars Imbrium.
Industry veterans including Ratan Tata (Tata Group), Nandan Nilekani (Infosys), Sachin Bansal and Binny Bansal (Flipkart) and Venu Srinivasan (TVS Group) among others have supported TeamIndus.
TeamIndus has already won USD 1 million under the competition for demonstrating its landing technology. Hakuto, on the other hand, won USD 500,000 Mobility Prize for the robotic rover it developed.
