Updated
Updated · WTOP · Sep 18
NASA Names 728-Foot Lunar Crater McGetchin After 2024 Asteroid Impact
Updated
Updated · WTOP · Sep 18

NASA Names 728-Foot Lunar Crater McGetchin After 2024 Asteroid Impact

3 articles · Updated · WTOP · Sep 18

Summary

  • NASA and the Universities Space Research Association said a comet or asteroid created the new McGetchin crater on the Moon between April 11 and May 22, 2024.
  • Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter images and data revealed the crater on the Moon’s eastern edge during a later review, and NASA said the impactor’s size and force are still being assessed.
  • Julie Stopar, an LRO scientist studying the event, said the strike may have produced a visible flash under favorable conditions, prompting a search for possible observations.
  • The announcement comes ahead of Saturday’s International Observe the Moon Night, when 22 events are planned in the Washington region alone.

Insights

How did a massive asteroid strike that carved a record-breaking crater on the Moon in 2024 go completely undetected by Earth's astronomers?
Could the violent debris scattered by rare, massive lunar impacts threaten the survival of NASA's future permanent bases on the Moon?
With thousands of unseen meteoroids striking the Moon yearly, are our current space monitoring systems dangerously blind to emerging cislunar threats?