Goodyear has joined hands with Lockheed Martin, a global security and aerospace company, to develop tires for lunar vehicles. The team of companies intends to be the first to establish extended-use commercial vehicle operations on the Moon.
The Goodyear Tire & Rubber Company supplied essential products for NASA’s Apollo program, including the Apollo 11 mission which landed on the Moon 53 years ago. The company will continue that tradition - focusing on lunar vehicle tires - by joining Lockheed Martin in its development of a lunar mobility vehicle.
Since Apollo, Goodyear continued innovating alongside NASA to advance designs for a lunar vehicle tire. It brings its vast expertise in a mission-critical component to traverse the lunar surface, tires.
Goodyear is drawing from its advanced airless tire technology used on Earth with micro-mobility, autonomous shuttles and passenger vehicles, to advance lunar mobility and withstand the challenging conditions on the Moon. The companies are already applying existing expertise to the project including testing concepts in lunar soil test beds.
Together, the teams are applying unique perspectives and shared expertise to new challenges and market approaches that are being considered for the first time. The companies expect to have their first vehicle on the surface of the Moon in time to support NASA’s first landed mission that will have the first woman and first person of color walk on the Moon, currently planned for 2025.
