NASA crashes into the Moon

[nakedgardener]

Is it just me... or is this just vandalism?

[ChrisR]

No more so than all the other junk that NASA has left up there ... or is floating around in Earth orbit Space is a pretty brutal place though and objects without an atmosphere, like the Moon, are hit by lumps of rock and ice all the time so I doubt a few spacecraft will leave much damage relative to what's gone before

[ron1863]

I heard on the radio that it has something to do with trying to discover if there is or was ever water on the moon

[ChrisR]

They need to kick up some dust and then analyze the spectrum of light given off and from that they can work out what kind of chemicals were in the dust.

[thunder]

Originally Posted by ron1863

I heard on the radio that it has something to do with trying to discover if there is or was ever water on the moon

It seems that the impact point is close to where they are planning to build the 'moon-station' and if they can prove the presence of water (ice) then that will help them a great deal.

henrya

[carlos_dfc]

First reports are that LCROSS was a bit of a 'damp-squib'

No obvious dust plume, or anything else, on the first pictures.

Maybe it was too small, and anything kicked up didn't get up out of the deep shadows in that crater..???

[Mr Mag00]

First reports are that LCROSS was a bit of a 'damp-squib'

No obvious dust plume, or anything else, on the first pictures.

Maybe it was too small, and anything kicked up didn't get up out of the deep shadows in that crater..???

brilliant, i would rather have seen the 10's of millions of dollars spent on water for people living on Earth now

[snowdrop]

Water on the moon? Why do I have a niggling doubt as to the reason for an impact at such depth? Surely if water crystals cannot be found at or near the surface, then the cost of transporting the means to recover the reportedly negligible amount from deep below, would far outweigh the effort?

Perhaps its just the nature of man to meddle with things he cannot mend but wants to control/understand.

[fairplay]

I think it missed it's target, and that Richard Branston had something to do with this.

The first thing a tourist would want on going to the moon is a swimming pool, it speaks for itself.

Neil.

[nytecam]

For those moderately interested the 6-8km wide crash plume has been detected [see www.spaceweather.com] but analysis not yet released