Home Business The Impact of an Ancient Asteroid on the Moon: Formation of Two Majestic Canyons

The Impact of an Ancient Asteroid on the Moon: Formation of Two Majestic Canyons

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The Impact of an Ancient Asteroid on the Moon: Formation of Two Majestic Canyons

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. — Recent studies reveal that a colossal asteroid impact on the moon billions of years ago resulted in the formation of two impressive canyons located on the lunar far side. This discovery is encouraging for scientists and NASA as they prepare for upcoming missions aimed at landing astronauts at the south pole on the near side of the moon, an area believed to be unaffected by this catastrophic event and containing ancient rocks in their original state.

Researchers from the U.S. and the UK utilized images and information gathered by NASA’s Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter to analyze the region and trace the trajectory of debris from the asteroid impact, which occurred roughly 3.8 billion years ago. Their findings were published on Tuesday in the journal Nature Communications.

The asteroid approached from over the lunar south pole, creating a massive basin and ejecting boulders at astonishing speeds of nearly one mile per second (1 kilometer per second). In just about 10 minutes, the debris crashed down like projectiles, excavating two canyons that are comparable in scale to the iconic Grand Canyon in Arizona. In contrast, the Grand Canyon’s formation took millions of years.

“This was a violent, dramatic geologic event,” noted David Kring, the lead researcher from the Lunar and Planetary Institute in Houston. His team posits that the asteroid was about 15 miles (25 kilometers) wide and that the energy required to carve out the canyons surpassed 130 times the total yield of nuclear weapons currently held worldwide.

Kring also mentioned that the majority of the debris ejected from the impact traveled in a direction away from the south pole. Therefore, the lunar site that NASA plans to explore around the pole, situated mostly on the near side, will remain largely free from debris. This ensures that ancient rocks, over 4 billion years old, will be accessible to astronauts for study. Insights gleaned from these rocks could illuminate not only the moon’s history but also that of Earth.

The permanence of shadows in these canyons, similar to certain craters at the moon’s south pole, remains unclear at this stage. “That’s something that we’ll definitely be looking into further,” Kring said. He also pointed out that regions permanently shadowed at the moon’s base are thought to contain significant amounts of ice, which could potentially be utilized as fuel or drinking water for future lunar explorers.

NASA’s Artemis program, which represents a new chapter following the Apollo missions, aims to send astronauts back to the moon within this decade. Preparations are underway for a mission that will orbit the moon next year, with plans for the first lunar landing by astronauts since the Apollo era projected within the next couple of years.