LRO scientists locate impact on Moon from rocket stage believed to be Chinese
The science team for Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) today released images identifying the location on the Moon where a mystery rocket stage crashed in March 2022.
The image to the right shows the before and after LRO images, with the impact at the center of the second photo, showing as two superimposed craters. Since the sunlight in the second image come from the opposition direction as the first, the shadows in all previously existing craters are reversed.
Surprisingly the crater is actually two craters, an eastern crater [59 feet diameter] superimposed on a western crater [52 feet diameter]. The double crater was unexpected and may indicate that the rocket body had large masses at each end. Typically a spent rocket has mass concentrated at the motor end; the rest of the rocket stage mainly consists of an empty fuel tank. Since the origin of the rocket body remains uncertain, the double nature of the crater may help to indicate its identity.
No other rocket body impacts on the Moon created double craters. The four Apollo SIV-B craters were somewhat irregular in outline (Apollos 13, 14, 15, 17) and were substantially larger [>115 feet in diameter] than each of the double craters. The maximum width [95 feet] of the double crater of the mystery rocket body was near that of the S-IVBs.
Though the evidence strongly points to this stage being from China, that fact is not certain, and China denies that conclusion.
Regardless, the unexpected double nature of the impact only increases the mystery, as it suggests that rocket stage had a mass distribution different than past stages.
On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.
The print edition can be purchased at Amazon or from any other book seller. If you want an autographed copy the price is $60 for the hardback and $45 for the paperback, plus $8 shipping for each. Go here for purchasing details. The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.
The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News
The science team for Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) today released images identifying the location on the Moon where a mystery rocket stage crashed in March 2022.
The image to the right shows the before and after LRO images, with the impact at the center of the second photo, showing as two superimposed craters. Since the sunlight in the second image come from the opposition direction as the first, the shadows in all previously existing craters are reversed.
Surprisingly the crater is actually two craters, an eastern crater [59 feet diameter] superimposed on a western crater [52 feet diameter]. The double crater was unexpected and may indicate that the rocket body had large masses at each end. Typically a spent rocket has mass concentrated at the motor end; the rest of the rocket stage mainly consists of an empty fuel tank. Since the origin of the rocket body remains uncertain, the double nature of the crater may help to indicate its identity.
No other rocket body impacts on the Moon created double craters. The four Apollo SIV-B craters were somewhat irregular in outline (Apollos 13, 14, 15, 17) and were substantially larger [>115 feet in diameter] than each of the double craters. The maximum width [95 feet] of the double crater of the mystery rocket body was near that of the S-IVBs.
Though the evidence strongly points to this stage being from China, that fact is not certain, and China denies that conclusion.
Regardless, the unexpected double nature of the impact only increases the mystery, as it suggests that rocket stage had a mass distribution different than past stages.
On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.
The print edition can be purchased at Amazon or from any other book seller. If you want an autographed copy the price is $60 for the hardback and $45 for the paperback, plus $8 shipping for each. Go here for purchasing details. The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.
The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News
Perhaps the payload had not detached? It would explain having a large mass at either ends of the booster.
That is quite a splash. Wonder where it came from? Does it have to be a rocket?
I did not know that Apollo stages crashed on the Moon. SOP at the time, but as a space-faring people, we need to ensure our act is clean. Don’t need to be contributing to the used spacecraft parts recovery market.
Blair Ivey: There actually were scientific reasons for crashing those Apollo upper stages on the Moon. The astronauts placed seismometers at each landing site, and geologists used the data from those impacts to better determine details about the Moon’s interior.