LOCKHEED MARTIN EXPLORER SCOUTS TO TEST MOONBUGGIES AT UNO
NEW ORLEANS, LA., April 5th, 2002 -- Local high school and college students will put specially-designed “moonbuggies” through a series of time trials from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. Saturday, April 6 as they prepare for the “Great Moonbuggy Race,” a NASA-sponsored international competition. The time trials will take place at the University of New Orleans.
For the past six months, the students representing Engineering Explorer Post 314 have been busy designing, analyzing and building three moonbuggies similar to those used by the Apollo rover team on the Moon some 30 years ago. Each moonbuggy is pedal-driven by a male and female team member and must fold up into a space no more than 4 feet high, 4 feet wide and 4 feet long to simulate the original moonbuggy designs.
On Saturday, the scouts will road-test their moonbuggies to prepare for the competition the following weekend at the U.S. Space & Rocket Center in Huntsville, Alabama.
Last year the New Orleans-based high school team with two moonbuggies placed second and fifth against 28 other teams, and the college team placed fifth.
Directions to moonbuggy time trials at UNO:
- At 4-way stop at Elysian Fields and Robert E. Lee on UNO’s campus, drive toward Lake Pontchartrain to traffic circle
- Loop around traffic circle to the left and get on Lakeshore Drive heading west toward West End
- Go only a short distance through construction area, up and over the levee and immediately turn right into parking lot.
Lockheed Martin designs and builds the Space Shuttle External Tank at the NASA Michoud Assembly Facility in eastern New Orleans and has sponsored the Engineering Explorer Post since its inception in 1996.
