NASA has made the difficult decision to cancel its Volatiles Investigating Polar Exploration Rover (VIPER) mission to the moon. The mission, designed to explore the moon’s polar regions for water, was originally scheduled to land in December 2022 but faced numerous delays, pushing the launch date to September 2025. With rising costs and the need to prioritize other lunar exploration projects, NASA has decided to terminate the VIPER program.
The rover, which was set to be launched under NASA’s Commercial Lunar Payload Services (CLPS) program, will now be disassembled. Its valuable instruments will be repurposed for other lunar missions. NASA emphasized its commitment to lunar exploration, stating that the cancellation of VIPER was a necessary step to ensure the continuation of other important missions.
The CLPS program involves partnering with private companies to facilitate moon missions. Other missions under this program include Astrobotic’s lunar lander, which successfully touched down on the moon earlier this year, and landers being developed by companies like Firefly Aerospace, Intuitive Machines, and Lockheed Martin.
Astrobotic, the company originally slated to deliver VIPER to the moon’s surface with its Griffin Mission One lander, will now proceed with the mission without the rover. NASA has confirmed that its contract with Astrobotic remains in place, and the launch and landing of the Griffin Mission One will serve as a valuable flight test for the lander’s capabilities.
As for the original goal of VIPER – investigating water at the moon’s south pole – NASA plans to explore this aspect through future instruments that will be part of crewed missions, such as the Artemis program. The Artemis missions aim to send astronauts back to the moon’s surface by 2026.
Although VIPER’s cancellation is a setback, NASA remains dedicated to the exploration of the moon and will continue to prioritize projects that contribute to a deeper understanding of the lunar environment.
