Asteroid hit the moon and flung rocks 120 kilometres from the crater — SkimNews
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- McGetchin crater, a 222-metre-wide impact scar spotted by comparing NASA Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter images from 2024 and 2025, is the largest lunar crater ever observed forming in real time
- Impact-frequency models cited in the study predict an impact this size should happen only about once every 132 years
- Tyler Powell at Johns Hopkins University measured surface temperatures around the crater and found a 7-kilometre-wide cold spot — several degrees cooler than the surrounding area during lunar night — caused by dust "fluffing up" after the strike
- Mark Robinson at Intuitive Machines led a separate team that found the 2024 impact hurled dust and rocks more than 120 kilometres from the crater itself
- Powell said the results overturn assumptions that impacts modify only the immediate crater region, showing they reshape lunar surfaces at distances far larger than the crater itself
- Both studies, published in Science Advances, establish a pristine baseline for tracking how new craters degrade over time and could inform planning for future rovers, astronauts, and infrastructure on the moon
Why it matters: For anyone planning lunar surface operations, the findings show that a 222-metre impact — an event expected only once every 132 years — scatters hazardous debris 120 kilometres and alters thermal properties across a 7-kilometre patch, meaning impact effects cannot be treated as localized when siting landers, rovers, or habitats.
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