"Huge Rock crashes into Moon"

[Tibbz2]

 

The moon has a new hole on its surface thanks to a boulder that slammed into it in March, creating the biggest explosion scientists have seen on the moon since they started monitoring it.

 

The meteorite crashed on March 17, slamming into the lunar surface at a mind-boggling 56,000 mph (90,000 kph) and creating a new crater 65 feet wide (20 meters). The crash sparked a bright flash of light that would have been visible to anyone looking at the moon at the time with the naked eye, NASA scientists say.

 

 

http://www.space.com/21197-moon-crash-meteor-impact-explosion.html

 

Visible to the naked eye! Pretty awesome for anyone who saw it!

[T A WOW]

Would've been awesome to see. Really hope someone got some footage of it.

[Tibbz2]

This is the only related video I found, and it's from the 17th so must be it!

 

[T A WOW]

Blink and you miss it. Still shows what it looked like.

[Tibbz2]

Indeed, quite surprising anyone was recording the Moon at the moment to see it!

[Orion]

Can the new crater be seen with a backyard scope and what aperture would be needed?  How many arc seconds across is the crater (or fractions of)?  I wondered because the resolution of a scope in arc seconds would tell us what size scope would be needed to theoretically see it.  If my memory is working ok, I thought from Dawes limit, my scope (8.75") could see down to ~1/2 mile in rare perfect seeing conditions with perfect vision (or photography). But I may be wrong or I didn't understand it.  But I thought I heard that someone had photographed a shadow from a lunar lander hardware.

[Doc]

Take a look here:

 

http://science.nasa.gov/science-news/science-at-nasa/2013/16may_lunarimpact/

 

They say the crater is about 20 metres in diameter.

[red dwalf]

cool

[Tibbz2]

Can the new crater be seen with a backyard scope and what aperture would be needed?  How many arc seconds across is the crater (or fractions of)?  I wondered because the resolution of a scope in arc seconds would tell us what size scope would be needed to theoretically see it.  If my memory is working ok, I thought from Dawes limit, my scope (8.75") could see down to ~1/2 mile in rare perfect seeing conditions with perfect vision (or photography). But I may be wrong or I didn't understand it.  But I thought I heard that someone had photographed a shadow from a lunar lander hardware.

 

 

Take a look here:

 

http://science.nasa.gov/science-news/science-at-nasa/2013/16may_lunarimpact/

 

They say the crater is about 20 metres in diameter.

 

Doesn't look like we'll be able to see it then!

[Guest Steve]

I'd guess there would be a larger debris field that may be a different shade of grey, (yes, I know, there are about 50 of them), so it may be more visible than it sounds. 

[Perkil8r]

The smallest craters visible from Earth tend to be approx 1Km across or so. Unless you are very familiar with the surface in that specific area I very much doubt you will spot any change in surface colour either to be fair although a valid suggestion. It would take a much larger collision to leave something visible from Earth by amateurs. 

[Orion]

What about, could it (and the outer debris area mentioned by Steve) be seen in some other part of the spectrum other than visible - e.g. infrared or ultraviolet? - that is, if anyone has CCD's sensitive in those wavelengths.  I guess 20m sounds far too small to be seen then.

[Tweedledee]

Here's the maths...

 

Moons diameter = 3474 kilometres.

Moons apparent size in the sky = about half a degree = 1800 arcseconds.

Maximum practical resolution of your average scope on a good night = about 1 arcsecond.

 

3474 km/1800 arcsecs = 1.9 kilometres

 

Even with a really large scope, seeing conditions would only allow a small improvement on the above. So as Mike said about 1 kilometre would be the limit at the very limit of visibility from Earth.

 

So I wouldn't waste any time looking for footprints in the Sea of Tranquility .

[Tibbz2]

Shame, but there's still plenty of craters there to look at, I'm always surprised by the amount of them I can see through the dob!

[red dwalf]

would shadows show up ?

suppose it depends on how deep the crater is.

[Perkil8r]

would shadows show up ?

suppose it depends on how deep the crater is.

 

In theory there may well be a point in the phase where the shadow cast is long enough to be viewed, but I doubt the pile around the rim is high enough to cast a sufficient shadow. I think you would need a really in depth knowledge of that area of the lunar surface to determine if it were new at that size.