Piece of SpaceX rocket believed to have crashed into the moon

rich_sasha 12 hours ago | parent | next [-]

SpaceX in a nutshell: simultaneously going to the moon and crashing.

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auspiv 12 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

which would make it the 37th+ spacecraft to hit the moon

(most S-IVB rocket stages and Lunar Module ascent stages impacted the Moon - not tracked individually on that page)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Spacecraft_that_impac...

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jrmg 13 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Will we be able to get pictures of this?

I presume that if the answer is ‘yes’ we will do so, and I’d like to see some!

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simondotau 13 hours ago | parent | next [-]

The answer is no. Hubble's visible-light resolution is about 0.05 arcseconds, which translates to 90 metres per pixel, far too large to make out anything that's "merely" bus sized. An imager would need to in orbit around the moon to have any reasonable chance.

It seems like they're hoping to detect the plume of dust caused by the collision, however.

	▲	NetMageSCW 13 hours ago \| parent \| next [-]
		The crater created by the impact with the dust throw around it will be bigger.
	▲	garaetjjte 13 hours ago \| parent \| prev [-]
		...but there's a imager in orbit around the moon, Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter.

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dylan604 13 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

Multiple lunar orbiters will be passing overhead at some point. They will produce images of the after effects that can be used in a before/after comparison. But the crash will(was??) not be televised or live streamed which is probably more along what you are asking.

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noiv 13 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

[flagged]

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altmanaltman 13 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

The memes write themselves

	▲	simondotau 13 hours ago \| parent [-]
		Astronaut 1: “Wait, the lunar landing system is just gravity?” Astronaut 2: “Always has been.”