Feasibility and Preliminary Design of a Moon Drone Vehicle

Design a small drone vehicle able to autonomously depart from the surface of a rover, hover and return to its base on top of the rover. The drone shall be able to inspect the area environment around the rover and assist the rover to explore the Moon surface 

This activity will provide for a preliminary design of a small drone vehicle that is able to autonomously depart from the surface of a rover, hover, and return to its base on top of the rover. Equipped with cameras (vision, multi spectral) and other instruments, the drone will be used to quickly explore the surroundings of the rover providing at larger distances observation and data and supplementing the observation data provided by some instruments of the rover. The drone will be equipped with a small propulsion system that will allow autonomy augment the action radius of the rover in tens of kilometres. Also, the drone will perform tasks of pre-inspection of the rover routes, inspection of deep craters where the rover cannot reach, inspection of the landing vehicle.