NASA to Fire a Rocket Into the Moon Today: Follow it on Twitter! (LAUNCH VIDEO)

We're going back to the moon today- to blow it up!  NASA's LCROSS craft at this very moment is on its way for the highly scientific mission of "smashing into the moon at nine thousand kilometers an hour". The next time someone says science is boring, feel free to laugh at them.

The purpose of the mission is to discover whether there’s frozen water in the craters near the moon’s south pole. If water is indeed found, it could have very important implications for further human missions on the moon, as a potential source for oxygen (you know why we need that) and hydrogen (for rocket fuel).

LCROSS’ launch date is today; it’s scheduled to launch at about 08:30 PDT. What’s totally cool about this mission is the fact that NASA is providing several of ways to follow the launch and the mission during the next four months.  If everything goes as planned, LCROSS should impact the moon in about 111 days. NASA promises the moon won’t be damaged (hummm), but you never know -there might be a Dr. Strangelove on the team.

First, you can watch the launch live at NASA TV. You can also follow LCROSS on Facebook  and Twitter. Finally, for pictures related to the mission, check out NASA’s Twitpic account.

The Lunar CRater Observation and Sensing Satellite (LCROSS) is investigating the possibility of water in shadowed craters near the Moon's poles, and we don't mean "looking carefully with telescopes" investigating - we mean "Dirty Harry" investigating, hitting things and shooting at them until you get some answers.  The LCROSS craft will drop a fully fueled Centaur rocket booster - yes, the type that you normally use just to get into space - to detonate a fairly impressive amount of the Moon. 

This will create a huge plume of debris because the moon's gravity is lighter than Earth's, and because you just exploded two thousand kilograms of rocket juice.  For a really close look LCROSS will fly right through the debris - possibly while rock music plays in the background - and then, for an even closer look, LCROSS itself will ram the moon and explode.  This will be observed by the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter, and while there aren't yet any plans to make the LRO explode, at this level of Insanely Awesome Science we can't rule anything out.

The only thing more exciting than the mission itself is what they're looking for - water ice hidden in permanently shadowed sections of crater walls.  A lunar water supply would be massive step towards a manned moonbase within our lifetimes, and if there's anything possibly cooler than exploding over seventy million dollars worth of space technology IN THE NAME OF SCIENCE, it's an actual moonbase.

Posted by Luke McKinney with Casey Kazan.

LCROSS! http://lcross.arc.nasa.gov/

Comments

[Ziggy]

Actually, the booster will be empty (as stated on NASA's website for the project). This is to prevent any contamination of the reading that the LCROSS probe takes from being contaminated by any remnant hydrogen/oxygen in the fuel that would otherwise be present. But hey, it'll still be a big bang; it will be traveling at over 33,000 mph when it hits the moon...

Z

[Ziggy]

My bad, it's not on the NASA website; it's here (complete with animated description)...

http://www.kqed.org/quest/television/lcross-animation-web-only

Z

[Basuto9]

Fifty years ago, this was a science-fiction movie. Now, I'm sitting at home in my air-conditioned living room, watching this on my home computer - still seems like science-fiction.

[EvilCosmicMonkeyfrom Knoxville]

Basuto9:
This was INDEED only imaginable in science fiction, once upon a time. Tracking satellites, watching charts of lunar phases, chatting with someone across the ocean on another continent via Internet chat, listenining to music & viewing art on - line -I've done ALL of those in the last 5 to 10 years !!!!!

The stuff of science fiction - Buck Rogers, Flash Gordon, Dick Tracy, etc. - is REALITY.

The future is NOW !!!!

[EvilCosmicMonkeyfrom Knoxville]

Approximately 3 & 1/2 minutes to go from the ground to the atmosphere's outer fringes. Wow !!

If the impact yields evidence of potential oxygen, hydrogen, & water, that's as good as finding GOLD, & we'll have a potential site for a Lunar base.

[EvilCosmicMonkeyfrom Knoxville]

Watching history is as good as making it, & if the impact yields evidence of minerals tha can be used in a lunar base, it would REALLY behoove us to go there in the the next decade, if not sooner.

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[Spazmonkey]

We are not doing this for water we are doing this to try to scare off the aliens