science
Before and after shots of Elon’s ejecta snapped by Danuri
The race for the first before-and-after images of the spent SpaceX rocket on the Moon has been won by the South Korean space agency.
The Korean Aerospace Administration (KASA) posted imagery from its Danuri lunar orbiter showing the impact site on the Moon on August 6.
The impact was predicted to occur on August 5, and marked a landing on the Moon for SpaceX several years ahead of schedule, just without humans onboard and traveling a good deal faster than planned.
The words “crater” and “SpaceX” are not something investors nervously tracking the company’s stock price following the weeks since its IPO will want to think about.
The impact came on the fourth anniversary of Danuri’s launch, on a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket. It took a few months for the probe to reach the Moon, and its initial one-year mission has since been extended twice – most recently through 2027. The plan is currently for Danuri to intentionally make its own impact crater in March 2028.
The upper stage of the Falcon 9 is expendable, and this one was used to send Firefly Aerospace’s Blue Ghost Mission 1 and ispace’s RESILIENCE to the Moon in 2025. On most Falcon 9 missions, the upper stage burns up in Earth’s atmosphere, but a lunar transfer orbit like this one made that impossible. In a post, SpaceX stated, “Impacts like this are rare, but they can happen with objects in these types of orbits, and we worked with NASA on the optimal disposal solution,” and wrote, “a controlled disposal maneuver is not always possible.”
NASA boss, Jared Isaacman, noted that NASA intentionally crashed spent stages into the Moon in the name of seismic research, and commented, “The reality is that meteoroids strike the lunar surface hourly, with impacts comparable to this upper stage occurring roughly every six days.”
Humanity has not done a great job of managing space junk around the Earth. While the SpaceX Falcon 9 upper stage did not pose any risk to humans, it highlights the need to devise rules for the use of lunar space rather than risk an uncontrolled buildup of debris.
In June, The Register spoke to Neuraspace boss Chiara Manfletti about how things might be done differently as lunar traffic increases. Neuraspace is all about satellite collision avoidance, and Manfletti’s ideas included requirements from stakeholders to designating dumping grounds on the Moon.
NASA’s veteran Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter was also attempting to capture the impact, and more images are likely to be released over the coming week.
Now to name the impact site. Elon Crater, anyone? ®
