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April 11, 2006

Because boys never stop enjoying smashing things, that's why.

LOS ANGELES - NASA plans to crash a space probe into the moon in 2009 — a collision so violent it will be visible on Earth through a telescope, the space agency said Monday.

Why? Think of NASA as a larger Mythbusters program. The boys there like explosions - and what could be cooler than directing an SUV sized impactor at 5,600 miles per hour at the surface of the moon?

Well, here's the official reason:

First, the craft will direct the upper stage used to leave Earth orbit to crash into a permanently-shadowed crater at the lunar south pole, creating a plume visible to Earth-based observatories. Next, the satellite will observe the plume and fly through it using several instruments to look for water. At the end of its mission, the satellite will itself become an impactor, creating a second plume visible to lunar-orbiting spacecraft and Earth-based observatories.

Smashing the second one, of course! They even provide simulated video. They don't actually have a third ship to fly through the second impact plume and then impact, but they have spectrographs to analyse it at least.

Scrawled illegibly by Meathe at April 11, 2006 09:45 AM

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