NASA engineers have simulated the lighting conditions at the South Pole of the Moon. This is necessary to prepare for the Artemis III mission, during which the aerospace administration plans to return humans to the Moon.
The Artemis III mission will differ significantly from the flights of the Apollo program era. At that time, astronauts landed in the equatorial regions of the Moon. The Starship HLS spacecraft will land at the South Pole, which has very specific lighting conditions. The sun is right at the horizon there, casting long shadows, and the bottoms of deep craters are never illuminated by its rays, which means that deposits of ice and volatile substances may exist there.
As part of preparations for the upcoming landing, NASA engineers simulated lighting conditions at the South Pole of the Moon. The Flat Floor Facility , located at the Marshall Space Flight Center, was used for this purpose.
The Flat Floor Facility is a room measuring 26.2 meters long and 13.4 meters wide. It has one of the largest, smoothest, and most stable air floors in the world, allowing heavy objects to be moved across the floor without friction and with minimal effort.
As part of the simulation, the testing team used large lamps with a power of 12 and 6 kilowatts to reproduce the low angle and high contrast conditions of the South Pole of the Moon. Large pieces of fabric were laid on the floor to imitate the reflective properties of lunar regolith.
“The goal is to understand how shadows will affect the visual inspection and assessment of the landing module during a future manned mission,” said Emma Jaynes, a test engineer at the facility. “Since the Flat Floor Facility resembles an upside-down air hockey table, NASA and our industry partners can easily move large and heavy structures and examine the effects of shadows from different angles, which helps ensure mission success and astronaut safety for Artemis III.”
The results of these tests will help NASA improve the models that will be used in preparation for the Artemis III landing. They will also enable the evaluation of various tools that astronauts may use.
“At the South Pole of the Moon, the Sun is at a constant low angle. This means that astronauts will experience high contrast between illuminated and shaded areas,” Jaynes added. “White can be blinding in direct sunlight, shadows behind a rock can extend for several meters, and shadows behind a landing module can extend for kilometers.”
The laboratory is large enough for people to walk around and observe this phenomenon with the naked eye. This is an important factor that helps us better understand what it will be like to stay at the South Pole of the Moon.
According to NASA
