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- radiodemon, on 08/14/2008, -2/+31...and then we realized the moon was actually full of propane, that's how we lost it.
- barcelona10, on 08/14/2008, -2/+26I wonder if the explosion will be visible from Earth.
- shutaro, on 08/14/2008, -2/+25Nuke the moon!!!
- Statictrap, on 08/15/2008, -1/+13Ejecta cloud will be visible from Earth with a 10-12" telescope or better, and if you have a viewing angle to the Pole of the Moon being impacted. Optimal viewing location for the mission is being designed to favor the Keck observatory on the Hawaiian islands, possible you won't be able to see it well from some of the continental US (because of being too close to Moon Rise or set, or sunrise or set).
On the expensive spacecraft comment, this is one of the cheapest missions ever flown by NASA. There are no current military missiles that could target the moon or even reach escape velocity, let alone with any accuracy beyond that. Assuming you created one, you cannot hit the Lunar Poles on a ballistic trajectory, and achieve impact angles required by the LCROSS mission (> 60degree) or with anywhere near the mass (>2000kg impactor at 2.5Km/s). Also, the 'observation' period after the impact will last roughly 4 minutes to make the water-ice determination and then the spacecraft itself impacts and makes another ejecta plume (though smaller than the first and). Due to Lunar gravity, the ejecta will be sprayed out in a large ballistic arc where the majority of large (potentially visible) ejecta will be pulled back down in a manner of several minutes. So sending a mission later to check out the impact will be worthless for the most part. Oh and by the way, all spacecraft that have gone to the moon have crashed there, landed there, or returned to Earth to burn up in the atmosphere - with the minor exception of a few manned return capsules from Apollo days. The Moon is a harsh mistress that eats spacecraft for lunch - NickLee808, on 08/15/2008, -0/+11It'll probably happen in 2037, where the moon will break into tiny fragments, causing humans to devolve into hunter-gatherers... and Guy Pearce will run into some albinos underground.
- Sonan, on 08/14/2008, -0/+10I doubt we could get a spacecraft close enough to the impact site to get good readings and still prevent it from impacting. Plus, what do we do with the craft after that? Let it just become more space junk floating around?
Plus, the pieces that are going to crash into the moon are the used-up rocket and a "bare-bones" spacecraft with some sensors to analyze the debris from the impact. The main "expensive spacecraft" from the launch will separate well in advance and go on to complete its mission separately. - Statictrap, on 08/15/2008, -0/+9The impact will be a 2100Kg Centaur upperstage body at 2.5Km/s. Quite a bit slower than a meteor impact, but much more mass than on average. Magnetic railgun studies in the lab predict that there will be a flash due to the friction and compression of impact that will last 100-200ms or so, primarily in the infrared. The eject cloud is modelled to be about 40-50 miles in diameter and reach a lunar altitude of close to 40,000 feet. The visibility of the ejecta will be due to the incident light reflection off the ejecta particles. It won't be visible with the naked eye, since the lighted portion of the Moon will be much brighter, but with a 10inch or so telescope, you should be able to isolate the area against the dark space backdrop and see the ejecta cloud progress (actually 2, since you get one due to the observation spacecraft impact 4 minutes later).
- Wilsomatic, on 08/15/2008, -0/+9...Moon...shine?
- photohunter, on 08/14/2008, -2/+11Just like in the movie Sunshine. You'll look up one day, and know they succeeded if you see a small bang. And then life will go on as usual.
- soupdawg30, on 08/15/2008, -0/+9This reminds me of the Time Machine.
- Sonan, on 08/14/2008, -0/+8When meteoroids hit the moon, there is potential for a flash to be visible from Earth, presumably caused by light reflecting off the resulting dust cloud. This occurred in 1999 with the Leonid meteor shower. I suspect the impact from these "artificial meteoroids" would be much the same, but I don't know enough about how their trajectory, size and speed compare to that of typical meteoroids. However, I do know there will be no "explosion" in the traditional sense, due to the lack of oxygen, and quite possibly lack of fuel as well.
- JackyAppleJones, on 08/15/2008, -1/+8Mr.Show was right....http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kHpX5aa5Lz4
- fuzzybeard, on 08/15/2008, -0/+7Ah, they're still pissed about Bugs Bunny nicking off with their Eludium Q-36 Explosive Space Modulator.
- fuzzybeard, on 08/15/2008, -0/+7...or lunatics, moonbats, werewolves, or anything that synchs to a lunar cycle in any way.
- FolkTheory, on 08/15/2008, -1/+7BREAKING: NASA unilaterally declares war on the Moon. hundreds of astronauts ready to go face the enemy-satellite...[click to read more]
- BedPost, on 08/15/2008, -0/+6Silly NASA. You bomb for _oil_, not water.
- armor, on 08/15/2008, -0/+5...and propane accessories.
- D1ckFace, on 08/15/2008, -0/+5not for lunarians
- newl, on 08/15/2008, -0/+5Where's the kaboom? There was supposed to be an earth-shattering kaboom!
- inactive, on 08/15/2008, -0/+4"Coming this fall...."
;D - nikkorizz, on 08/15/2008, -1/+5This isn't a bomb as much as it is just getting a spacecraft crashing into the earth to create a plume of debris.
When I saw "Bomb the Moon" I was reminded of The Time Machine 2002 Movie which has been playing on TV recently. In it, they bomb the moon in a mining operation and end up shattering the moon, which ends up destroying much of Earth from falling debris. Of course, such a small scale collision such as the one in the article would not even come close to having that same effect as what happened in the movie, still, it's still food for thought. I imagine it would take a heck of a lot of nukes to tear the moon apart. - agimat, on 08/15/2008, -1/+5Meh, we'll worry about it if we survive that Hadron Collider thingy.
- soupdawg30, on 08/15/2008, -0/+4Why would it not be safe to crash a small spacecraft into the moon?
- psevium, on 08/15/2008, -0/+3If not, here's hoping they line up Hubble or someone to watch it
- mttyd, on 08/15/2008, -0/+3Didn't anyone see the remake of Time machine? Where the moon breaks into pieces?
- nocash23, on 08/15/2008, -0/+2in the immortal words of mr show:
"We think the monkey's a hundred percent right. We're spending so much money--millions of dollars--to blow up the moon, when there's so much right here on Earth to blow up. Mount Everest, the North Pole, etcetera....We're Earthlings, let's blow up Earth things." - Flappity, on 08/15/2008, -0/+2Read the article before you make stupid comments, please.
- Stormwern, on 08/15/2008, -0/+2Duck Dodgers in the 24½'th century!
- Kanten, on 08/15/2008, -0/+2"We have an announcement to make, on July 4th of this year, America will blow up the moon."
- starmanjones, on 08/15/2008, -0/+2first we've already done this before. its not a weapon. it crashes and we analyze whats in the resulting cloud.
moon gets blown off course? serioulsly? did you just discover space 1999? what planet are you on again? :D - PigGeneral, on 08/15/2008, -0/+2Excellent info Statictrap. Thank you very much.
- Dealjobber, on 08/16/2008, -0/+2McCain: Bomb Bomb Bomb the moon.
- sphira, on 08/15/2008, -0/+2the telescope may fall into the Earth's atmosphere some time after 2010.
http://www.planetary.org/explore/topics/hubble/ - soupdawg30, on 08/15/2008, -0/+2You gotta admit it would look awesome, if we are going to get wiped out might as well go with some badass fireworks.
- BluFire, on 08/15/2008, -0/+2blow the moon we cant have waves
or so i've been told - samyoungguitar, on 08/15/2008, -0/+1Hopefully they ***** up the tides and then have to bomb the Atlantic Ocean. Only Bush can come up with an idea to bomb the moon and the ocean.
- waspbr, on 08/15/2008, -0/+1sound waves don't exist in vacuum, only in matter
- gcnaddict, on 08/15/2008, -0/+1Maybe that's what's frozen on the moon.
- bmcnally, on 08/15/2008, -1/+2Funny how the comments went from informed readers to inane once the story hit the front page.
I guess this one is pretty inane in that I don't have anything to add, except that it's good to see NASA going back to the Moon. - samyoungguitar, on 08/15/2008, -0/+1Wow.. I think you take me too seriously.
- Statictrap, on 08/15/2008, -0/+1That's about right. But LCROSS is not a flying piece of Junk, it just isn't going with all the redundancy and backup capabilities most missions have. There are some 'used' parts that were taken advantage of, but these items were flight spares for other missions that were no longer going to be used, so they were parts that were already paid for and flight qualified. The flight computer and much of the avionics are identical to the other spacecraft on the mission (LRO) that is about 6 times more expensive than LCROSS. It is lower cost by taken advantage of work already done on other missions, leveraging flight qualification testing by similarity, etc. It is a very high quality spacecraft, that takes advantage of opportunities to save money.
- inactive, on 08/15/2008, -2/+3Would you miss it? Would you?
- mttyd, on 08/15/2008, -0/+1DUH... Everyone knows it's made of cheese...
- jeremyduffy, on 08/15/2008, -0/+1That is so freaking creative :) I can just imagine a little probe on the bottom of the MRO grabbing the spent rocket and steering it around then tossing it at the Moon. It's awesome!
- Stormwern, on 08/15/2008, -0/+1The next phase in the war on terror.
- smurfsahoy, on 08/15/2008, -0/+1NASA would love to find oil. Oil is far better evidence of life than water is. It's dead, compressed organic matter.
- Yage2006, on 08/15/2008, -0/+1***** the moon.
- MadHarvey, on 08/15/2008, -0/+1The Moon has had it coming for a long time. Dancing circles around us, making us look fat and slow, all while giving that smug look all the time. Its about time we did something about that crater-faced *****..
- smurfsahoy, on 08/15/2008, -0/+1This is a spacecraft we are smashing into it, not the entire himalayan mountain range...
And the moon could probably be knocked significantly off course anyway without really doing all that much. It would have to be completely thrown out of orbit or into the Earth to really screw things up majorly. - legsthebass, on 08/15/2008, -0/+1What? Seems kind of ignorant to assume there's a 'scanner' that can tell us all these things and we haven't used it yet.
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