Private company plans US's first controlled moon landing in 40 years

A U.S. spacecraft hasn’t made a controlled landing on the moon since Apollo 17 left the lunar surface on Dec. 14, 1972. That’s about to change.

Private company plans US's first controlled moon landing in 40 years Moon%20Express%20MX-1%20Selfie%20on%20the%20Moon

Private company plans US's first controlled moon landing in 40 years Moon%20Express%20MX-1%20Selfie%20on%20the%20Moon

Moon Express will unveil the MX-1 spacecraft at the Autodesk University show in Las Vegas on Thursday evening -- a micro-spacecraft that will in 2015 mark the first U.S. "soft" landing since the days of the Apollo program, FoxNews.com has learned.

The craft looks for all the world like a pair of donuts wearing an ice cream cone, and the tiny vehicle clearly isn’t big enough for a human being. But it is big enough to scoop up some rocks and dirt, store them in an internal compartment, and return it to Earth. After all, the moondirt Gene Cernan, Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin once trod holds a king’s ransom of titanium, platinum, and other rare elements.

Moon Express plans to mine it.

“We call it the iPhone of space,” Bob Richards, co-founder and CEO of Moon Express, told FoxNews.com, citing the MX-1’s flexibility. The "microlander" can deliver up to 130 pounds of cargo to the surface of the moon, or act as a sample return vehicle or a "space-tug," he said. It uses hydrogen peroxide as rocket fuel -- a high-test version of what you'd get in a drug store. And it is surprisingly small.

http://www.foxnews.com/science/2013/12/05/moon-express-first-us-moon-landing-in-40-years/

Private company plans US's first controlled moon landing in 40 years

Private company plans US's first controlled moon landing in 40 years

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