NASA's Moon Blast a Public Relations Disaster

Who do they think they are.Why dose america always have to throw large bombs at everything they meet that isnt american. Nevermind looks like they are going to be way behind all the other countries coming up with space programs and soon they wont be able to afford one or maybe they will keep that partnership with china

what i dont understand is why would they need to fire a missile at the moon just to find moisture/water if they “SUPPOSEDLY” have already sent people to the moon why not dig or try to pump water out?? wow a missile? i think its a very ignorant and stupid idea

Why would you want to blast our most cherished emblem of the sky???? And why would you think there is water there?? And Why would you waste enormous energy transporting the water?? And what is your vision of an earth with teleports of rocket pads everywhere?? I thought Gore and the whole crowd of pollution brigade were against waste and pollution? Think of the enormous noise and rocket pollution. Come on! Knock it OFF! Remember the H bomb boys in the deserts of the USA! They didn’t know what the hell they were doing! And then had regrets!

Seriously, I think the world has gone Insane, but then I think you always have been, from the annals of history. Leave the frickn’ moon alone!

Reading the mass of uninformed posts that started cropping up starting at page 2 gave me a good chuckle. I honestly hope they were as trollish and sarcastic as some of them sounded; I’d be pretty disappointed if any were serious.

If we actually did go to the moon in 69 and collect samples, why don’t we know what it’s made of? And, why have we not been back in 40 years?

Only paranoids can guess themselves superior knowledgible than NASA.

Over Reacting!

It doesn’t even make any sense if you think the blast gonna create ecological or orbit-related problems. moon is a satellite.. for God sake.., let the good work be continued.

I find it hilarious that paranoid metaphysical-minded wackos think they know more than NASA scientists.

It is in mans nature to play god. But this is way beyond the boundaries that should never be crossed. Just a cover up of U.S. To hide their secrets on the moon.To what price do we have to pay for a system that only cares about themselves, and not the population of the world that they are putting in harms way!!!!!!!!!!!

BAD idea! Never mess the balance of our world, we have done enough of that. Let’s face it, we won’t be living on the moon so why ruin it.

Aren’t we destroying the earth enough???I guess history never teaches us anything, so that now the “big brother” is not only watching you but also destroying you!!!Too bad there are no “living beings” “visible on the moon or otherwise it would be “colonialization”???

How do they know that they might not be pissing the moon people off by attaking the surface.

Why not send a robot excavator to softly land and drill and exploritory well in peacable manner.

The Moon will neither be destroyed, dislodged, damaged or even slightly miffed. 1) The amount of energy that would be required to push the Moon out of orbit would be greater than it’s structure could handle, it would simply disintegrate before it budged. 2) A 50km plume of debris will eventually fall back to the surface of the Moon under it’s own gravitational field, so nothing will be lost. 3) The Moon has been hit by much larger objects in the past, and guess what, it’s still there! 4) A crater the size of a football field, and as deep as a swimming pool is utterly insignificant to a planetary body the size of the Moon.

I say add a nuke to the impactor payload, just to make sure it’s visible from Earth ;).

The trolls are out in force.. Either that or people really are idiots. Good lord, either way.

The trolls are out in force.. Either that or people really are idiots. Good lord, either way.

Here’s an article from someone who doesn’t like the idea:

http://rense.com/general86/moonbomb.htm

No one has mentioned perchlorate.

“Since the early 1990s, the EPA has been conducting a toxic assessment of perchlorate, a major component in rocket fuel, used by the military and its contractors in bases throughout the country.

“The chemical is incredibly widespread. It shows up in the groundwater of 35 states from New England to California; it has contaminated 153 public water systems in 26 states. Between 17 million and 40 million Americans are exposed to perchlorate at a level many scientists consider unsafe. According to a 2006 CDC study, 36 percent of American women are iodine deficient, putting them at risk for perchlorate-related thyroid problems. Due in part to perchlorate-contaminated irrigation water, most Americans who eat lettuce in the winter ingest the chemical. It has also appeared in melons, spinach and milk, according to 2005 and 2006 studies by the Food and Drug Administration.”

(From “Bush’s Toxic Legacy The EPA’s ‘Stalin Era'” 10 November 2008)

No one has mentioned perchlorate.

“Since the early 1990s, the EPA has been conducting a toxic assessment of perchlorate, a major component in rocket fuel, used by the military and its contractors in bases throughout the country.

“The chemical is incredibly widespread. It shows up in the groundwater of 35 states from New England to California; it has contaminated 153 public water systems in 26 states. Between 17 million and 40 million Americans are exposed to perchlorate at a level many scientists consider unsafe. According to a 2006 CDC study, 36 percent of American women are iodine deficient, putting them at risk for perchlorate-related thyroid problems. Due in part to perchlorate-contaminated irrigation water, most Americans who eat lettuce in the winter ingest the chemical. It has also appeared in melons, spinach and milk, according to 2005 and 2006 studies by the Food and Drug Administration.”

(From “Bush’s Toxic Legacy The EPA’s ‘Stalin Era'” 10 November 2008)

I think this idea is really stoopid. I mean, what if the moon is like the earth and has a spirit, like giaia, only it’s like lunaa and since nothing has ever hit the moon before, the big explosion traumatizes the poor little moon, who then bugs his big sister, you know, gaiai, and all the complaining gets her all depressed and all, and she breaks out in acne, which means tons of volcanoes, and we all could die in the firy inferno.

It could happen.

Or the explosion could wake a space alien that crash landed on the moon like a zillion years ago and makes him mad so he comes here and kill us all?

Did anybody consider these scenarious? Really stoopid.

>> “Remember that “large collider” thing they built in europe, that was threatening to create a black hole until someone from Australia, I think it was, sued them and halted the insane experiment.”

Wayne, you’re believing too much Murdoch owned media. What they were testing happens naturally. The collider had had various delays and repairs, it is very sophisticated. Scientists DO consider ramifications. It is people who know nothing about a project, are gullible enough to believe any fairy tale about it, and then assume they MUST know much more than a consensus of scientists who have studied something for decades . . . those people are the REAL problem. These sorts of opinions ruin it for the analytical, educated, and thoughtful environmentalists, and reflects badly on all (which is kind of what this article does).

To make it a bit clearer:

THIS IS NOT NEW. It’s been done before. We’re not the only country doing it. This is more precise and specific in goal than most earlier attempts on the moon and other extra-terrestrial bodies.

CLEANER, ENVIRONMENTALLY LO-IMPACT ENERGY, which Helium-3 from the moon, and platinum from extra-terrestrial resources may well provide, is a goal worth supporting . . . which is the reason that . . .

MANY COUNTRIES HAVE A LUNAR PROGRAM at this point. It is believed there are very valuable resources and technological advantages to setting up colonies on the moon.

WE ARE NOT ENDANGERING THE MOON, its orbit, its shape, or any of that. Again, this is NOT new.

WE ARE NOT ‘LITTER’ING up the moon (as we have LEO). Any part of the impacter that isn’t vaporized may well be used in the future. What is considered ‘litter’ here will be of some value on the moon, where recycling will be more critical than here.

FIXING THINGS ON EARTH, a common theme, generally requires a robust space program. That is why over 50 countries now have satellites in space for communications, navigations, weather, earth observation, and other uses. Actually putting the money from the space program elsewhere might well have very little impact. We spend 1% (or less) of our annual budget on the program, and it has returned much more in life-impacting benefits. It would hardly be noticed (or most likely, be misspent) if placed elsewhere, and quite possibly make much less of a positive impact.

IT SOUNDS TERRIBLE. If this is your argument – and the original article and many responses here seem to indicate that – Please study the space program . . . its past, present, and future goals and impact on humanity a bit before commenting on how it ‘sounds’. After all, the earth may ‘look’ flat . . . but its not. Study it a bit before reacting.

To make it a bit clearer:

THIS IS NOT NEW. It’s been done before. We’re not the only country doing it. This is more precise and specific in goal than most earlier attempts on the moon and other extra-terrestrial bodies.

CLEANER, ENVIRONMENTALLY LO-IMPACT ENERGY, which Helium-3 from the moon, and platinum from extra-terrestrial resources may well provide, is a goal worth supporting . . . which is the reason that . . .

MANY COUNTRIES HAVE A LUNAR PROGRAM at this point. It is believed there are very valuable resources and technological advantages to setting up colonies on the moon.

WE ARE NOT ENDANGERING THE MOON, its orbit, its shape, or any of that. Again, this is NOT new.

WE ARE NOT ‘LITTER’ING up the moon (as we have LEO). Any part of the impacter that isn’t vaporized may well be used in the future. What is considered ‘litter’ here will be of some value on the moon, where recycling will be more critical than here.

FIXING THINGS ON EARTH, a common theme, generally requires a robust space program. That is why over 50 countries now have satellites in space for communications, navigations, weather, earth observation, and other uses. Actually putting the money from the space program elsewhere might well have very little impact. We spend 1% (or less) of our annual budget on the program, and it has returned much more in life-impacting benefits. It would hardly be noticed (or most likely, be misspent) if placed elsewhere, and quite possibly make much less of a positive impact.

IT SOUNDS TERRIBLE. If this is your argument – and the original article and many responses here seem to indicate that – Please study the space program . . . its past, present, and future goals and impact on humanity a bit before commenting on how it ‘sounds’. After all, the earth may ‘look’ flat . . . but its not. Study it a bit before reacting.

This is an intelligence test, right?

The history of the Moon is a history of bombardment. The only difference between those impacts and this one is knowing precisely where and when the impact will occur, and an opportunity to uncover the source of hydrogen known to be locked into the regolith of both lunar poles.

This is an OUTRAGE! NASA is crashing a satellite into the moon? Does the government know they are doing this? It seems to me these days that scientists do not think about the possible negative consequences of their actions any more. Remember that “large collider” thing they built in europe, that was threatening to create a black hole until someone from Australia, I think it was, sued them and halted the insane experiment. Now our own space people are stirring up god knows what on the moon in some hare brained scheme to find an ocean. Hey NASA, you can clearly see there is no water with just a cheap pair of binoculars. Can you give me the $50 billion dollars or whatever this stupid experiment is costing us taxpayers?

This is an OUTRAGE! NASA is crashing a satellite into the moon? Does the government know they are doing this? It seems to me these days that scientists do not think about the possible negative consequences of their actions any more. Remember that “large collider” thing they built in europe, that was threatening to create a black hole until someone from Australia, I think it was, sued them and halted the insane experiment. Now our own space people are stirring up god knows what on the moon in some hare brained scheme to find an ocean. Hey NASA, you can clearly see there is no water with just a cheap pair of binoculars. Can you give me the $50 billion dollars or whatever this stupid experiment is costing us taxpayers?

It is my great pleasure to make public that THIS IS WRONG!!!!!It feels and sounds like a bunch of would-be-scientists who were about to go out of business came up with a hair brained idea to get “back into the game” and decided amongst themselves to bomb the moon. My question is how on Earth did this get by all of us? I am just now hearing about this. This is something that is really important and should have been discussed at length before NASA was given the go-ahead. I am not comfortable with the fact that a ‘D class’ devise is going to orbit the Earth three times before it explodes on the Moon either. If NASA defines LCROSS as being “unlikely to succeed”, then why are they worth risking something going wrong, like say missing the mark and landing on Earth somehow? It’s a great risk and now it seems that I have to just sit and let it happen because it’s already out there. In four months from July it will blow. This whole thing blows! Just think what we could do with that money? Whoever is responsible for this is a real idiot!

Counterpoints to popular mechanics article.

1)Their “it’s already cluttered with previous human refuse” attitude is HORRIFYING. Outta sight outta mind appears to be their attitude so I shouldn’t be suprised they have such a glibb attitude about using the moon as nasa’s landfill. That mentality is part of how were in our current global pollution situation. Shouldn’t part of space exploration be to make ways to cleanup after ourselves?

2)They have the attitude “it’s already taking a pounding…what’s the harm if humans do it intentionally”. We’re barely learning to mitigate our impact on THIS planet. So I suppose they want our first planetary impacts to be of destruction and carelessly irresponsible management of used materials that WE brought there?

This is the beginning of the Mayan prophecy?

Will a large chunk of the moon break off, and slowly work its way to destroy Earth in Dec. 2012?

Will a small chunk of the moon be like the draft of a butterfly`s wing which creates a typhoon on the other side of the world?

Or, will it provide information such that we can seriously entertain the idea of establishing a colony on the moon?

This is the beginning of the Mayan prophecy?

Will a large chunk of the moon break off, and slowly work its way to destroy Earth in Dec. 2012?

Will a small chunk of the moon be like the draft of a butterfly`s wing which creates a typhoon on the other side of the world?

Or, will it provide information such that we can seriously entertain the idea of establishing a colony on the moon?

This is not a very well written article. Zack, in case you didn’t read the article, they are looking for water on the Moon to determine the possibility of establishing a full time base there. Do you know how much money it would cost to have to constantly shuttle water from Earth to the Moon? I don’t, but if it was cheap why the hell would they waste their time with this? Seriously.

Check out the response from Popular Mechanics: http://www.popularmechanics.com/science/air_space/4317333.html

Check out the response from Popular Mechanics: http://www.popularmechanics.com/science/air_space/4317333.html

For those who weren’t sure why we’re impacting . . . the idea is to search for water and other useful minerals.

Why? Partly because we are scientifically curious, partly because we hope to find some commercially useful materials, and partly because the more we find, the less we have to take with us.

Why do we want to go back? Pretty much for the same reasons China, India, Japan, Russia, the ESA, England, Germany, Italy (as projects separate from ESA), and others all want to get to the moon and have active lunar space programs now. Helium-3 is one big item. Rare and expensive here, it is abundant on the moon, and may very well be the fuel of the future. (The equivalent of just one shuttle-load of H3 would be worth more than we spend in 6 years on ALL the space program currently.)

There are other minerals of interest as well. It’s expected that some of the asteroids contain platinum, and the moon would be an easier base to set out from and come back to.

So in addition to the obvious scientific advancements, many countries see this as a critical part of controlling energy and resources in the future (that is . . . this time the race is somewhat more than political in nature). Extremely expensive at first, as costs come down, lunar production may prove as important as communications, weather, navigation, observation, and military satellites are to us now. (There were times when people wondered why anyone would spend any money on space).

This is not that new. We’ve done impact followed by analysis before on bodies in space as have other spacefaring organizations and countries. This particular craft is a bit more advanced and the analysis more specific. Sometimes everybody gets lucky and we can analyze a meteor or asteroid hit on another surface, but for specific location analyses, impact studies (either through a device specifically designed for that purpose or through use of an expended orbiter or other exploration vehicle) has been done before (just not quite with this precision). So why pay heed to the opinions of people who have not followed any of the programs in the past, and when it comes to any real understanding of space exploration, are still on par with those who think the sun orbits the earth? It demeans the more serious messages available on this site.

This is not that new. We’ve done impact followed by analysis before on bodies in space as have other spacefaring organizations and countries. This particular craft is a bit more advanced and the analysis more specific. Sometimes everybody gets lucky and we can analyze a meteor or asteroid hit on another surface, but for specific location analyses, impact studies (either through a device specifically designed for that purpose or through use of an expended orbiter or other exploration vehicle) has been done before (just not quite with this precision). So why pay heed to the opinions of people who have not followed any of the programs in the past, and when it comes to any real understanding of space exploration, are still on par with those who think the sun orbits the earth? It demeans the more serious messages available on this site.

I’d like to second (and third and fourth and fifth and so on) Marshall Perrin’s comment earlier.

Honestly, people.

@Vicki

The dust cloud may be barely visible with an amateur telescope, says so in the last sentence.

Also whenever we decide to venture into near planetary space we will need ready access to water for lots of things. You can’t manufacture water out of anything except H & O. If you carried those into space, they could supply a fuel cell to reconstitute the water and produce power. It would be better to take up a small nuclear power plant for power and take water from the moon, if there is none, forget planetary space travel.

Producing water on earth is an entirely different issue.

Also the moon is likely the remains of a massive collision between the early earth and another planetoid that reshaped the earth and surrounded it with a debris field which later coalesced back into the current moon.

And we have sent previous impactors to other places, like a comet, it wasn’t harmed, something was learned.

well i dont get it.. what is the use of impacting the probs on the surface. NASA needs a place to land and LRO is doing the job. Plus i think japanese did a really good job with their Kaguya probe which really captured some amazing HD footage including earth rise.

http://astroaviator.com/2009/08/28/the-hd-moon/

well i dont get it.. what is the use of impacting the probs on the surface. NASA needs a place to land and LRO is doing the job. Plus i think japanese did a really good job with their Kaguya probe which really captured some amazing HD footage including earth rise.

http://astroaviator.com/2009/08/28/the-hd-moon/

This article about a “public relations disaster” is a joke right?

Otherwise, I wasted the last 60 seconds reading it.

I may not be a ‘rocket scientist’ but isn’t the earth made up of 75% water, I just don’t see the reason to attack the moon in search of water..seems kinda silly NASA! Not to mention all the other issues ‘here on earth’ that should be addressed first.

I may not be a ‘rocket scientist’ but isn’t the earth made up of 75% water, I just don’t see the reason to attack the moon in search of water..seems kinda silly NASA! Not to mention all the other issues ‘here on earth’ that should be addressed first.

Knock the Moon off its gravitional field? More like we will throw a bunch of dust up and obscure a few full Moon nights.

Why are we looking for water? If any long term missions to the Moon or Mars are to be successful we must be able to figure out the water problem down here on earth first… meaning we must somehow manufacture water artificially in space.

Really, knock the moon off it’s gravitational field?!? Do you realize how big the moon is and how many times it gets hit? The moon is not a planet, it is a satellite and many planets get hit worse than this with little problems (I believe it was comet Shoemaker-Levy that hit Jupiter). 1.6195×10^23 lbs is the mass of the moon, average SUV’s are 5000-7000 lbs. That makes the moon 2.6991×10^19 times larger than an SUV. It is like a pebble being thrown at you if you where 90ft tall. Don’t you think people a little smarter than you might have thought of some of this or maybe people who know about astro-physics might just realize that this is nothing and not worry about it, but thank you for your educated opinion.

Really, knock the moon off it’s gravitational field?!? Do you realize how big the moon is and how many times it gets hit? The moon is not a planet, it is a satellite and many planets get hit worse than this with little problems (I believe it was comet Shoemaker-Levy that hit Jupiter). 1.6195×10^23 lbs is the mass of the moon, average SUV’s are 5000-7000 lbs. That makes the moon 2.6991×10^19 times larger than an SUV. It is like a pebble being thrown at you if you where 90ft tall. Don’t you think people a little smarter than you might have thought of some of this or maybe people who know about astro-physics might just realize that this is nothing and not worry about it, but thank you for your educated opinion.

I don’t think it takes a genius to realize that this is a stupid idea. This is a massive impact we are talking about and planets are not meant to be hit so hard. What if this knocks the moon off of its gravitational field. We sure will look stupid then.

Next, NASA plans to blow up the worlds oceans.

Haha, it took me a while to realize the sarcasm in this post, nice one Ross.

I’m disappointed – this unimpressive post is a far cry from what I like to see on Cleantechica. For one thing, I’m a space scientist myself, so I appreciate the interest in space news- but this doesn’t seem all that related to clean energy.

But far more importantly, this just plain isn’t a good article! The fact that many commenters online dislike something is *far* from a reasonable statistical sampling of public opinion. Online comment boards often draw only those who feel most strongly about an issue, either positive or negative, and miss out on the vast silent majority who might care a bit either way, but not enough to bother writing.

Finally, the two comments that you’ve picked to highlight are utterly unworthy of the attention. One is an ad hominem attack with no informative capacity whatsoever, and the other displays an almost complete ignorance of the relevant physics. Please don’t provide a platform to this sort of ignorance, unless you’re going to immediately debunk it with sound science. The media’s portrayal of fringe, unscientific fearmongering as equivalent to rational thought and empirical facts is deeply troubling today, and I hate to see it here. Please take a look at Phil Plait’s recent post on this topic: http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/2009/09/08/the-mainstreaming-of-evil/

I’m disappointed – this unimpressive post is a far cry from what I like to see on Cleantechica. For one thing, I’m a space scientist myself, so I appreciate the interest in space news- but this doesn’t seem all that related to clean energy.

But far more importantly, this just plain isn’t a good article! The fact that many commenters online dislike something is *far* from a reasonable statistical sampling of public opinion. Online comment boards often draw only those who feel most strongly about an issue, either positive or negative, and miss out on the vast silent majority who might care a bit either way, but not enough to bother writing.

Finally, the two comments that you’ve picked to highlight are utterly unworthy of the attention. One is an ad hominem attack with no informative capacity whatsoever, and the other displays an almost complete ignorance of the relevant physics. Please don’t provide a platform to this sort of ignorance, unless you’re going to immediately debunk it with sound science. The media’s portrayal of fringe, unscientific fearmongering as equivalent to rational thought and empirical facts is deeply troubling today, and I hate to see it here. Please take a look at Phil Plait’s recent post on this topic: http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/2009/09/08/the-mainstreaming-of-evil/

“5,600 mph (9,000 km/h), which is roughly twice the speed of a bullet.”

Not to nitpick… but not all bullets can achieve ~ 4000 fps, 5600mph is about 8200 feet per second.