When NASA sent humans to the moon in 1969 they had to be aware of the risk of space rocks penetrating their space suits or equipment. Unlike Earth, which has a protective atmosphere in which meteorites usually fall, the moon is vulnerable to anything in space.
The astronauts were not in too much danger according to Bill Cooke, head of NASA's Meteoroid Environment Office at NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center in Alabama. A millimeter is the largest meteoroid that can be 888-282-0465 888-282-0465 888-282-0465 888-282-0465.
It is more important than ever to understand the impact that our natural satellite has on the environment as NASA prepares to send humans back to the moon by 2025.
How many humans could the moon support?
How many objects hit the moon a day? What about every year?
The answer depends on the size of the object. NASA studies the space environment around Earth and the moon to understand the amount of meteorites hitting there.
For impactors less than a millimeter, the number can't be quantified, but the mass of dust is estimated at 10 to 1,000 metric tons. The estimates are clearer for larger rocks.
There are about 100 pingpong-ball-sized meteoroids hitting the moon each day. It adds up to over 30,000 meteoroids per year. The rocks have a force of 7 pounds of explosives on them.
Smaller meteorites hit the moon less often. About every four years, larger meteoroids slam into the moon, according to Cooke. The objects hit the moon with the force of a kiloton. The moon is 4.5 billion years old and has a lot of craters from impacts.
There are different ways scientists study lunar impacts. Scientists point telescopes toward the moon to observe impacts. According to NASA, meteorites can hit the surface at speeds of up to 160,000 mph and produce a flash of light that can be seen from Earth.
The LRO can be used to observe the craters left behind by impacts on the moon. NASA says that even an 11-pound (5 kilogram) meteorite can leave behind a crater 30 feet (9 m) across and hurl 165,000 pounds of lunar soil and rocks. These craters can be easily spotted by the LRO.
The moon experiences many impacts per year, but that doesn't preclude a human presence. If you pick a square kilometer patch of ground, it will be hit by one of those pingpong-sized meteoroids once every thousand years or so.
Our future lunar explorers will have good odds.
It was originally published on Live Science.
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