NEWSCOM
NASA moon bombing? Well, sort of. NASA will send a spacecraft to destroy a crater on the moon on Friday in search of water ice.
NASA moon bombing: It’s true, but don’t worry
On Friday, NASA will bomb a crater in hopes of finding water vapor on the moon.
By Amy Farnsworth | 10.08.09
UPDATE: NASA has successfully “bombed” the moon. Click here for the story.
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Have you heard?
NASA is going to bomb the moon Friday morning.
Well, sort of…
On Friday, NASA will send a spacecraft, the Lunar Crater Observation and Sensing Satellite (LCROSS), to destroy a crater near the south pole of the moon in search of water ice. (You can watch NASA’s $79 million LCROSS mission live tomorrow morning – right here.)
In September, we reported the sighting of water on the moon. Now, NASA is searching for more evidence.
The satellite (LCROSS) will deploy an interior rocket, named Centaur, and strike the moon’s Cabeus crater at 6,000 miles per hour, around 7:30 a.m. EDT on Friday morning. After Centaur slams into the crater, NASA will use the remaining satellite before it crashes to measure a pair of debris plumes – which may include water vapor – for water ice. Shortly afterward, the satellite will crash into the moon.
Some people may be able to view the crash through telescopes that are 10 inches or larger, according to NASA. For more details on viewing the collision from your backyard, click here.
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2. necrophyte | 10.08.09
Seventy nine million dollars. SEVENTY NINE MILLION.
There’s obviously no better way to spend that kind of money.
3. antigreenpeace | 10.08.09
The first comment must have been submitted by a tree-hugger…go weave some more baskets and don’t worry about what Nasa does..it’s over your little head anyway.Who else should put their nose in the business of studying the moon? Go bury your head in the sand, because you are probably dumb enough to think that bombing the moon is going to cause a cataclysmic event.
Studying and learning leads to innovative inventions, ideas, improvements, cures, and Knowledge.
You are never too old nor too smart to stop learning.
4. UpNorth | 10.08.09
It does feel pretty insulting to have this kind of money being spent to test a theory that really doesn’t affect my life at all. I don’t care about water on the moon, I DO care about jobs, the economy and how we are going to make it through the “recession”.
5. danny a | 10.08.09
what is goin to happen when stupid people like raveena burn up our planet and the try and hitch a ride with nasa to mars
6. chris8 | 10.08.09
OMG, you people who think NASA is going to destroy the moon, can’t you think for yourselves? Look at the moon some day. It has craters all over it! It has been hit by some pretty big rocks in the past. Comparatively, we’re hardly denting it. We’ve done far worse to our own planet! And people (those of you who think the moon is hollow), don’t you think we know the mass of the moon? We do, and we’re familiar with its general chemical makeup. We know the gravitational pull it exerts on our earth (watch the tides!), so really, people, learn to think!
7. Kyle Moore | 10.08.09
RaveenaValentine,
what you have just said, is the most insanely idiotic thing I have ever heard. At no point, in your rambling incoherent response were you even close to anything that could be considered a rational thought. Everyone in this room is now dumber for having listened to it. I award you no points and may God have mercy on your soul.
8. Ferahtsu | 10.08.09
Yeah, NASA isn’t afraid to admit that they know extremely little about outer space. Even then, we know more of outer space than we do our own oceans. Read a book Raveenavalentine
9. Ortiz | 10.08.09
Yes Valentine is right. “LEAVE OUTER SPACE ALONE”. I think 2012 has them spooked.
10. u2runku | 10.08.09
Here we go again, bombing things to *.come; well any who sure hope this means NASA won’t be killing any sort of life forms, I would of rather we had planned on sending a drill rig or a pile driving machine to do the job (more peaceful) and more of what NASA should take into account as to what eathlings are and should be about.
Meanwhile I would of rather have received some of that funding right onto my wallet (not my bank account) so that my bettermeant of the human race been promoted.
12. JustinHobaugh | 10.08.09
We need to explore outerspace, its the next frontier. If there is a signifigant amount of water on the moon or even ice it will be a huge breack through. Plus, at 79 million thats actually cheaper than some US military aircraft
13. Akim | 10.08.09
up with learning down with people who think people think they know everything when this project its being done to learn more about outer space.hmmmm
14. Cheryl Frances | 10.08.09
Why NASA spent alot of money to strike the moon even though our economic in the world is in trouble. If hit the moon, earth’s surface and weather will be changed worst. Sciencists know nothing but God knows. Does God allow?
15. Anonymous | 10.08.09
What NASA is doing is seeing if the moon could potentially support life, to see if we can send people there. And considering that we spent over $100,000,000,000 on the iraq war, $70 million is like pennies.
16. Carrie Jones | 10.08.09
I don’t think this is a good idea at all. What if something goes terribly wrong? The moon should be left alone.
17. James Walker | 10.08.09
Okay, you guys. Nintendo spends more on their research than we even spend on our military (which is a lot more than 79 million).
I heard that people were talking about how the moon is hollow. How is that even possible. By scientific law, the dense materials flow to the center; that means the middle has to be filled with something that is more dense than the surface.
NASA has their reasons for doing it.
By the way, if people are so concerned about destroying the moon, don’t you think NASA hasn’t thought of that already?
19. Carlos Corona | 10.09.09
Truth be told, 79 million dollars should be spent on people with needs around the world, not space exploration. Why have they abandoned their morals?
20. TryTeaching | 10.09.09
PEOPLE! Instead of ripping and insulting the person (RaveenaValentine) who posted their outrage about NASA bombing the moon why not use your self expressed superior intellect to explain what exactly the project is about. Or is it over your head as well? You can’t very well blame someone who sees headlines like “NASA bombs the moon” - someone who like most of us, has no in-depth knowledge of NASA’s project pipeline, for freaking out about that. Bombing the moon to a layman sounds like an insane thing to be doing. PERIOD.
I had to read several articles from a variety of sources just to get a handle on what they were trying to do and even now I can’t understand why they could not come up with something less violent - something that causes less debris to be floating about space (this is already a problem with the trash we are leaving in space). I think NASA serves an important role and if there is in fact water and possibly life on the moon I certainly want to know about it. What I wish we could do is have civil discussions with each other. If someone is expressing an idea that seems uninformed then just inform them - don’t be cruel about it. That’s not helpful. In fact is shows your own stupidity and insecurities.
Be Well.
21. William Yao | 10.09.09
A lot of your math is wrong. To get you a little perspective on how much $80 million really is in terms of U.S. finances. Currently the US population is about 300 million. So this experiment will cost each of us $0.26 or 26 cents. The war thats been going on in Iraq and Afghanistan cost the US about $120 billion a year and so far about $900 billion has been spent since 2001, so this cost each of us about $400 a year or about $3000 so far. So I don’t know about you but I think $3000 is a lot more than $0.26 and that pursuing knowledge is better than killing other humans.
Those of you worried about something bad happening as a result of the experiment, consider this The moon, or even earth for that matter, is always constantly being hit by meteors, many of them on many many magnitudes bigger than anything we can ever build, but the Moon and Earth and even life on Earth are still here to this day.
All these facts should be up-to-date. If not feel free to correct them.
22. Muzikman | 10.09.09
“And considering that we spent over $100,000,000,000 on the iraq war, $70 million is like pennies.”….. Whaaa???? Did you just try to justify why we should spend more of the tax payers money?!?! There’s that darned fuzzy math again! As much as I love astronomy, $79 mil seems a little excessive. We could do quite a bit to help the families that were / are affected by the economy and or Katrina with just half that amount. I don’t think NASA should stop exploring, but maybe they ought to consider going Green! Lead by example! Finding water on the moon!! Really!! Reminds me of Shakespear’s “Much ado about nothing”.
23. I care | 10.09.09
Why cnt u guys waste your money on something helpful. Thers a billion people suffering right now n ur going to bomb the moon. Thats so important. Yes it wud give us alot of important info on the moon but really wat matter most right now.?
24. Rick Thomas | 10.09.09
I’m really disturbed by a lot of comments posted on here. It’s like what NASA does is useless and a waste of money to most of you. NEWS FLASH folks, since its conceptions for every dollar we’ve put into NASA we’ve received three dollars in all it’s technological advancements. Just think about where the laser, most house hold plastics, Velcro, fiber optics, electronic, communications, and etc were all conceived or harnessed to be used practically? And back to whether the moon has water or not would be amazing if it did. Because if there is a significant amount that means we can have permanent bases on the moon. We can manufacture water and breathable oxygen on the moon from the moon without “shipping” it to the moon. We could then harvest all that H3 that’s rare on earth but in abundance on the moon. That’s thinking economic.
25. Joe Cooper | 10.09.09
The Moon has rare earth metals like platinum that we use for things like fuel cells and solar cells. We’ll need these resources for the upcoming energy crunch. Right now we get them from China.
So this absolutely effects you; the Moon has immediate material value to us. Even India is committing resources to this, and they’re on a much tighter budget than us.
Before we can saunter on over there and start mining we need to know what other resources are there. Water is a key resource. I’ll tell you why.
Water would provide fuel for oxygen-hydrogen engines that we’ve been running since the 60s and have a lot of experience with. It would also make it a lot more realistic for humans to go work on-site, because you don’t have to ship water!
If not, than we would need to develop either oxygen-aluminum fuelled engines, or ship hydrogen and build machines to harvest oxygen from the soil, or build nuclear engines that could use lunar sodium as propellant. We would also need to develop our robotics a lot further.
All this would be way more expensive. Developing a new engine from scratch can cost billions! So if dropping an empty rocket and an $80 million dollar probe into dirt will help us find water, its money well spent.
26. Steveoreck | 10.09.09
It’s a Scientific experiment and as with all science it must be funded. If the idea of spending so much money bothers you talk to the people on the committee to fund NASA. As for the use of the word bombing, Only those who get there news and info from headlines without reading a story deserve to live in angst over such imaginings.
If we are to ask why do we do this thing? Why do we need to? For what purpose and to what end? So be it.
I myself cannot wait until something happens to shake up this old world of ours like the discovery of something incredible.
29. Anonymous Too | 10.09.09
One day, our salvation might lie in outer space after we wreck Earth. 79 million is a drop in the bucket compared to other things. Keep in mind - we have freeze dried foods, microwave ovens, GPS, etc because of military research and funding. GO NASA!
30. wilfredo buluran | 10.09.09
god created all heavenly bodies.if this project is successful god permits it happen, if not do not repeat this type of venture again.just leave it go god.
bro freddie
31. GoGiants | 10.09.09
What a waste of money. Haven’t they done enough research on the moon to know that no one in their right mind would want to live there even if they could. Here’s a thought; how about we take care of the people here on earth instead of spending millions of dollars on a pipe dream.
32. Annointed1 | 10.09.09
Why not just leave nature alone? NASA may have investigated outerspace but how sure can anyone be that they have pure facts? What if something happens and threatens our entire existance?
33. ginga | 10.09.09
people are acting as though GPS and electronics are good for us. at some point there will be too much electrons /electronic waves hanging around in the air (thanks to NASA) and the entire world will just shut down, no lights, not water in our pipes NOTING ELECTRONIC. then we can thank NASA for interfering. we are in the window of a big shift by 2016 it will all be over and done with. imagine not being able to get on the internet, thanks TO CURIOUS NASA. By the way, to those of you speaking about God, NASA DOES NOT BELIEVE IN GOD, THEY BELIEVE ONLY IN SCIENCE. may god be with you all
35. Maddie | 10.09.09
Crime is running rampent across our country, people out of work, the continued wars, and NASA could at least wait until life on this planet is under control before bombing the moon. Just suppose that inside the moon is all water, it blows up, and it all drops on us?????
36. Ryan | 10.09.09
ginga,
You’re silly.
Maddie,
Have you ever wondered why rockets become enveloped in flame when they enter or leave our atmosphere? What does water do when it heats up?
Come on guys…logic. Use it.
37. Angel Z. | 10.10.09
I can’t believe the limited thinking of so many people. We have to look ahead to the future and move forward. THe moon may be where we launch missions in the future, missions that may lead us to resources out there that we need, especially in the future. Someday we will need to consider what we are going to do if life here becomes unlivable. Then we will be wondering why NASA didn’t spend more while they still could.
We should always be moving ahead..looking forward. The moon is the first step of many.
38. the great one | 10.15.09
Need to leave the moon alone. We have nearly desecrated mother earth, and now are working on the moon?? Nothing GOOD will come from it. And yes, to all u idiots in favor of this moronic happening, go to hell.
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2. Friday morning, 10/09/09 NASA will crash a rocket into the Moon at a loss of $79 million dollars!! « Life On The Sandbar | 10.08.09
3. Twitter Trackbacks for NASA moon bombing: It’s true, but don’t worry | csmonitor.com [csmonitor.com] on Topsy.com | 10.08.09
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1. RaveenaValentine | 10.08.09
Is money all that you all think that is important! The moon sound be left alone, NASA has to put their noses in everything and in somethings that should be left alone! WTF is your all’s problem get a life! It’s people like NASA who think that they know everything about outer space when really they don’t know diddly crap. LEAVE OUTER SPACE ALONE!!!! Up with space down with NASA!!!