Moon impact to make base dream closer
Published: 09 October, 2009, 15:40
Edited: 10 October, 2009, 11:01
NASA has crashed a satellite and its booster rocket into the moon's surface, a moment closely scrutinized by scientists across the globe.
They smashed the booster of the Lunar Crater Observation and Sensing Satellite (LCROSS) into the surface inside the Cabeus crater, near the Moon’s South Pole at a speed of 9,000kph, or seven times the speed of sound.
The impact was expected to kick up an estimated 250 tons of lunar dirt. The moon dust will be analyzed by the satellite on its way through the debris, before it is also hits the surface. The secondary cloud will be further studied by the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO), another NASA probe on a mission to the Moon.
Scientists are looking for signs of water and other minerals which could be used to supply any future lunar base. Since part of the Cabeus is never lit by the Sun, chances are high that considerable amounts of water have accumulated there over millennia. Traces of hydrogen, which forms part of water molecules, have already been detected on the Moon by Indian and NASA lunar missions.
It's not the first attempt to create explosions on the Moon. In 1959, the Soviet Union planned an atomic blast there to show off its military might, but the project was abandoned for fears the bomb could fall to Earth instead.
Space expert, Dr. Yury Karash, says the next step after the evaluation of the data gathered by LCROSS will be: “the return of the Americans and some other countries together with them to the Moon, and the more direct analysis of the Moon’s soil and its natural resources in order to explore the Earth’s natural satellite, in order to establish a permanentl-inhabited base on its surface”.
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This is great. Finally are we beginning to really prepare a moon colony. Though, it would be better if countries were better to cooperate on this effort. It is worth to mention that also the US was thinking of blowing up a nuke on the moon... russians and americans and your need to show your might to the world :D The first big controlled human made impact on the moon was actually a part of a Saturn V rocket, in order to get some sort of geological data. Roscosmos was planning to send multiple probes into the moon in order to learn about the geology... I`m looking forward to it, that is, if the project isnt scrapped because of the financial crisis:/
How about an earth colony? There are so many places on Earth that are inhospitable due to excessive cold or heat, yet, have resources in abundance that could be used for productive human endeavors. Instead, humans just pack huge cities, and those cities are becoming unmanagable and expensive to maintain. And in the city, bureaucracy is always called work. Humans need a different habitat on this planet to liberate themselves from the mortgaging their future for a tiny apartment.