'Moonspike' Kickstarter Project Aims to Crowdfund Rocket to the Moon
Source: Space.com
A team of rocketeers launched an out-of-this-world Kickstarter campaign today (Oct. 1) to raise $1 million for "Moonspike" – an ambitious project to launch the first crowdfunded rocket to the moon.
The Moonspike project aims to launch a small titanium payload carrying photos and videos from project backers into space, and ultimately crash it into the moon. The resulting dust plume from the impact should observable from orbit, its backers say. While a science return from the mission would be desirable, the main goal is to see if a small group of engineers can create a moon rocket and payload for a reasonable amount of money, Chris Larmour, a co-founder of the project and serial space entrepreneur, told Space.com in an e-mail. It's the first campaign of its kind, with the Kickstarter page going live at 7 a.m. ET (1100 GMT) today.
"We've been working hard to develop our rocket and spacecraft designs over the past few months and today we are opening up our feasibility study document to the public," Larmour said. The other co-founder is Kristian von Bengtson, also a co-founder of Danish private space travel group Cophenhagen Suborbitals. [Related: How Crowdfunding Helps Spur Space Projects]
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The crowdfunding campaign will be "all or nothing," he acknowledged, with no Plan B if they don't raise the desired million. But if it does end up working out, the group plans to raise several tens of millions of dollars more through more traditional equity financing routes. The initial Kickstarter money will be used for hardware development and other setup to make investors more interested in the product, he added.
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Read more: http://www.space.com/30712-moonspike-private-moon-rocket-kickstarter-campaign.html
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The concept was conceived by Dr. Alan Binder of NASA's Lunar Research Institute.
There were various efforts to raise funds from private donations, long before the concept of 'crowdfunding.' I was at one conference dedicated to the project. We had some interesting organizations participating, from students to radio amateurs. Finally, NASA picked up the concept as part of its Discovery program of low-cost, high science return missions. It was then known as Lunar Prospector.
The aim of the Lunar Prospector mission was always, primarily to map possible source of water on the moon. The deep, dark, cold craters at the lunar poles were of special interest.
