“SPACE: the final frontier. These are the voyages of the new Toyota Lunar Cruiser. Its continuing mission: to explore strange new worlds, to seek out new life and new civilisations, to boldly go where no one has gone before.”
This adapted extract from the 2009 Star Trek movie is also the job description of the Lunar Cruiser, of which it has to be said, “it’s a Toyota, Jim ... but not as we know it”.
Designed in collaboration with the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (Jaxa) and named the Lunar Cruiser in due deference to the legendary Land Cruiser, this Moon cruiser also introduces the latest genre of conspiracy theories that speculate about a sudden rush among global powers to mine the Moon. “Wait ... what?” you ask. “Precisely”, say the conspiracy theorists, who point out that U.S., Russia and China have all in recent months announced plans to send manned missions to mine lunar loot.
On May 5, Reuters reported that U.S. President Donald Trump had signed an executive order to draft a new U.S.-sponsored international agreement called the Artemis Accord to mine the Moon. Two months later, Russia rejected the accord, saying it will work with China, whose small lunar cruiser “Little Rabbit” landed on the dark side of the Moon in 2013.
With Nasa’s recent plans for manned lunar missions cancelled almost, this announcement barely made a blip on the radar. But signs are that things may be different this time and when the funders are ready to make more footprints in the lunar dust, Toyota plans to be ready too.
The Lunar Cruiser uses fuel cell electric vehicle (FCEV) technologies, which explains Toyota’s insistence on researching hydrogen fuel cells.
Toyota and Jaxa plan to launch the cruiser in the next nine years. Meanwhile, they are working to manufacture test parts for the prototype rover itself, to be ready in this fiscal year.
As part of their efforts to create new partners with “Team Japan”, Jaxa and Toyota have been holding study meetings to set up “a lunar society pioneered by the manned pressurised rover”. The meetings reportedly focus on how the Lunar Cruiser can help establish a Moon-based society.
At Witness Wheels, we predict lunar mining will spark a new vogue for boxy car shapes as the Lunar Cruiser inspires a new generation of star-struck vehicle designers. We just hope the Moon miners do not read Robert A. Heinlein’s The Moon is a Harsh Mistress when they start looking for a cheap way to send rocks from the Moon back to Earth.
