the surface ofmoonfull of potholes There was one more basin. On Friday morning US time From the crash of more than three tons of space junk and the first time an accidental lunar crater from man-made debris. According to the report of the Bureaunews Associated Press และ The Wall Street Journal
It is believed that such space debris moving at a speed of 9,300 kilometers per hour It’s a remnant from a Chinese space rocket. that soared into space 10 years ago, although the Chinese authorities do not believe it is theirs
But no matter what country Scientists believe this piece of space junk will result in a basin regarding 10-20 meters wide on the lunar surface. Big enough to hold several large trucks. And will cause the dust from the moon to spread hundreds of kilometers away.
The European Space Agency estimates that 36,500 pieces of space junk are currently in Earth’s orbit. Tracking low-orbit space junk or not very high from the earth usually easy to do Objects in space that are higher up tend not to hit anything. and was eventually forgotten but often does not escape the eyes of “Space detectives” who love to observe and keep an eye on these space objects.
One of those space detectives is Bill Gray, who in January He discovered that the space junk was in orbit to crash into the moon. He initially identified the debris as parts of the US spacecraft company SpaceX’s rocket. But in February, Bill Gray corrected the information. It said the “puzzle” object was not the head of the SpaceX Falcon rocket that soared into space in 2015, but was part of a Chinese rocket. that took the capsule to collect samples from Earth to the moon and returned to Earth in 2014.
Chinese authorities have countered that the top of the Chinese rocket has fallen back into the world. However, The Wall Street Journal reports that the debris likely came from the spacecraft Chang’e-5 T1 (Chang’e-5 T1) that went into space. in 2014, and Chinese officials have denied The Chang’e-5T1 spacecraft may be confused with the Chang’e-5 spacecraft, which has a lunar exploration mission in 2020.
US Space Force or US Space Command, which is responsible for tracking space junk that is not far from Earth. confirmed on Tuesday that The upper part of the Chang’e-5T1 rocket, a rocket operated by a rocket to explore the moon, never returned to Earth’s orbit But the US Space Force can not confirm that Where did the fragments hitting the moon originate from?
As for Bill Gray, a mathematician and physicist, told thenews The AP said he was confident the object was a Chinese rocket.
The Center for Near Earth Object Studies endorsed Bill Gray’s assessment, while most recently Team from the University of Arizona which uses telescopic telescopes has identified the space junk as part of a Chinese rocket. from the show reflected from the colors on the rocket The object is 12 meters long, 3 meters in diameter, and goes back and forth every few minutes.
However, Jonathan McDowell of the Harvard and Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics which certifies Bill Gray’s assessment as well, saying that no matter what country’s space junk The result was the same. That is, it will give the moon another pothole. From the estimated that there are already more than one hundred thousand holes. Some of the holes are as large as 2,500 kilometers in diameter.
And because this new hole will be born on the dark side. or the far side of the moon Therefore, it is difficult to determine the impact that will occur. And it may take weeks or months to get an answer using satellite imagery.
