NASA reveals the landing site on the moon of the ice-hunting rover VIPER.

We now know where the first-ever NASA moon robot will land.

NASA officials announced that the ice-hunting Volatiles Investigating Polar Exploration Rover (VIPER) will land just west of Nobile Crater, which sits near the Moon's south pole today (Sept. 20). Then, in late 2023, VIPER will fly to the Moon aboard Griffin, a lander built by Astrobotic of Pittsburgh, which will be launched at the top of a SpaceX Falcon Heavy rocket.

"Selecting a landing site for VIPER is an exciting and important decision for all of us," Daniel Andrews, VIPER project manager at NASA's Ames Research Center in Silicon Valley, said in a statement.

"Years of study have gone into the assessment of the polar region that VIPER will explore," said Mr. Andrews. "The VIPER travels into uncharted territory, guided by science, to test hypotheses and uncover critical information for future human space exploration."

VIPER is an essential component of NASA's Artemis program, which seeks to establish a long-term sustainable human presence on and around the Moon by the late 2020s. To reach this goal, NASA officials said it would be necessary to use lunar resources, particularly water ice.

Observations from NASA's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter and other spacecraft suggest that the Moon harbors much water ice, particularly in permanently shaded areas (RSP) near its poles. The VIPER is designed to bring this kind of work to light, telling scientists how much ice is there and how accessible it is to humanity.

Nobile is 36 square miles (93 square kilometers) of land. The 950-pound (450 kilograms) solar-powered VIPER will measure and characterize the water ice beneath its wheels at various locations throughout Nobile, including PSRs, which are among the coldest spots in the entire solar system. VIPER will do this work over at least 100 Earth days using three spectrometers and a drill to obtain samples from up to 3.3 feet (1 meter) underground.

"The data VIPER returns will provide lunar scientists around the world with further insight into our moon's cosmic origin, evolution, and history, and it will also help inform future Artemis missions to the moon and beyond by enabling us to better understand the lunar environment in these previously unexplored areas hundreds of thousands of miles away," Thomas Zurbuchen, head of NASA's Science Mission Directorate, said in the same statement.

The VIPER team had considered four finalist landing sites near the Southern Moon Pole for the four-wheeled robot. The other three were an area outside Haworth Crater; a ridgeline running from Shackleton Crater; and a spot near Shoemaker Crater, VIPER project scientist Tony Colaprete of NASA Ames said during a news conference today.

The four finalist sites are intriguing, and all seem to be adopted at the same time scientifically and logistically, Colaprete said.

"Ultimately, it came down to the total number of working days," he said during today's news conference, explaining that a "working day" is one in which the rover has enough sunlight to operate and can also communicate with Earth. (Such communication will be direct from VIPER to its handlers; the robot will not use a relay satellite.)

"We need at least ten days to fulfill the requirements of our mission," said MP Colaprete. "There are over 40 of them in Nobile, which was a lot more than any of those other places."

The total cost of VIPER's mission is expected to be approximately $660 million — $433.5 million for mission development and operations plus about $226.5 million for the delivery contract with Astrobotic, which includes the cost of launch, NASA officials have said. This delivery agreement was signed as part of NASA's Commercial Moon Payload Services Program.

While VIPER will be NASA's first uncrewed rover to hit the gray dirt, it won't be the agency's first wheeled lunar vehicle of any kind: NASA launched astronaut-driven moon buggies on the final three Apollo missions, in 1971 and 1972.