NASA spacecraft confirms water ice deposits on moon

Making a bigger splash than expected, the crash of an empty rocket stage in a permanently shadowed crater near the moon's south pole last month kicked up a surprising amount of water ice and vapor, confirming the presence of a potentially valuable resource for future space travelers.

"I'm here today to tell you that indeed, yes, we found water," said Anthony Colaprete, the project scientist and principal investigator for the Lunar Crater Observation and Sensing Satellite. "And we didn't find just a little bit, we found a significant amount."

Holding up water jugs to make the point, he said "if you remember, a month ago we were talking about teaspoons going into glasses over football fields. Well, now I can say today that in the 20- to 30-meter (65- to 100-foot-wide) crater LCROSS made, we found maybe about a dozen of these two-gallon buckets worth of water."

And more than water. Data from the LCROSS instruments show signs of other compounds that may shed light on the moon's evolution.

"It's a whole lot more beyond the water," Colaprete said. "That's the exciting part in my mind, it's not only about the water now. There's actually a lot more here that we're going to be talking about in the months ahead, looking at the LCROSS data."

Spectroscopic data from NASA's LCROSS lunar impactor shows the presence of water in two specific bands (yellow regions).

(Credit: NASA)

Said Greg Delory, a researcher at the University of California at Berkeley: "This is not your father's moon. Rather than a dead and unchanging world, it could in fact be a very dynamic and interesting one that could tell us unique things about the Earth-moon system and the early solar system."

Michael Wargo, chief lunar scientist at NASA headquarters in Washington, said the discovery holds promise for future exploration. Using solar energy, future astronauts could, in theory, break down recovered ice and in effect live off the land.

"Water can be used for the kind of things we think about every day, drinking water if we have extended crews on the surface," he said. "You can break it down and have breathable air for crews to breathe. But also, if you have significant quantities of this stuff, water really is the constituents of one of the most potent rocket fuels: oxygen and hydrogen."

Whether the water ice detected by LCROSS might be accessible to future astronauts remains to be seen. But scientists were elated with the initial findings.

The $79 million LCROSS mission was launched June 18 as a companion payload to NASA's $504 million Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter spacecraft. Working in a 31-mile-high orbit, LRO is designed to create a high-resolution map of the moon's surface to help identify sites for future manned missions.

It also is measuring the solar and cosmic radiation that future lunar explorers will face and mapping out the surface topology, mineralogy, and chemical composition of Earth's nearest neighbor. One year will be spent scouting future landing sites followed by three years of purely scientific observations.

While LRO was launched directly to the moon by an Atlas 5 rocket, LCROSS and the booster's empty Centaur upper stage were sent into a looping four-month orbit back around the Earth.

The spacecraft aimed itself and the attached Centaur stage back at the moon, targeting a permanently shadowed crater near the south pole. Data from previous spacecraft indicated the presence of hydrogen in the polar regions, possibly associated with water ice just below the surface.

LCROSS mission managers initially selected a target crater known as Cabeus A, but after additional analysis of topographic data, the target was switched to nearby Cabeus, a crater measuring some 62 miles across and about two-and-a-half miles deep.

LCROSS successfully separated from the Centaur stage the night before impact, rotated 180 degrees to aim its instruments forward and then followed its doomed companion to the surface, trailing it by about four minutes.

The Centaur is believed to have hit the moon within about 650 feet of the planned target, blasting out a crater 65 feet to 100 feet across. Colaprete showed photographs from LCROSS Friday that clearly showed the plume of debris kicked up by the crash. Another photo showed the crater itself. LCROSS flew through the ejecta cloud, collecting data all the while, before crashing a short distance away.

The Centaur impact was not particularly impressive to the untrained eye--a pinpoint flash of light in the inky darkness of the crater's shadowed terrain--and many observers, expecting a more dramatic show as indicated in NASA animations, were disappointed.

But Colaprete said Friday the impact more than lived up to scientific expectations. Spectroscopic data from two instruments aboard LCROSS clearly showed the presence of water ice, along with a variety of other materials, in the ejecta plume.

Shown is the ejecta plume at about 20 seconds after impact.

(Credit: NASA)

"We can constrain right now how much water we think is in the field of view of our instrument," he said. "Based on these measurements, there is more than 100 kilograms in the field of view of our instrument. What does that mean, a hundred kilograms? That's the dozen or so two-gallon buckets I described.

"But what we need to do next is take all the information, the amount of ejecta, the size of the crater, how this all changed over time and actually reconstruct the entire event, understand how it all fits back into the ground along with all the other things we've seen in the ejecta plume to really understand this whole thing."

Delory said more analysis will be needed to figure out where the water ice originated.

"One possible source of the water is from comets," he said. "If that's true, and the lunar polar regions really are repositories for this material, they are a literal treasure trove of information in terms of the composition of comets, which are themselves indicative of early solar system conditions. That would be of extreme interest to many planetary scientists."

Another possibility, he said, is that the water ice is the result of chemical reactions that start with the solar wind, "which is basically an ionized gas streaming from the sun composed mainly of hydrogen."

"It impacts the lunar surface, undergoes chemistry, eventually these molecules hop around the moon and end up concentrated around the poles," he said. "Studying those deposits would tell us something about solar history, also about the history of chemical reactions occurring on the surface of the moon. Two completely different theories, we don't know which one is right yet."

Other sources are also possible, he said, including deposits from molecular clouds the solar system may have passed through earlier in its evolution as well as subtle chemical processes on the moon itself.

[scholwinski]

well im glad that you found water on the moon thats nice but in a time when our economy is at its worse yor spending 75 million dollars to go reasearch some water this is outrageous some help your doing for the economy.

[cowlquape]

... well, clearly someone knows very little and should do some research before posting

[DOGLLAMA]

lol, leave the science to the big kids buddy

[iertry]

And clearly you have no idea how the economy works. The reason it is in a slump is because consumers are spending less. Therefore spending $75m is helping the economy. It is also creating lots of jobs and those employees then have money they can spend which benefits the economy. Those business that have goods purchased then benefit, and so on.

[SilentDaeth]

Plus the fact that the initial mission was already at an end for this lil probe and this was added on at the end. So really, we got more for our money than we would have originally. Not to mention that I believe no matter the current status of the economy, eliminating scientific research and discovery is a terrible idea. We can only improve with more knowledge.

[SteveW928]

@ iertry -
No, the economy is in a slump because a whole bunch of people spent a whole lot of money they didn't have... and so did a lot of companies... and so did the government... and people finally woke up to that reality. Everyone has realized that the 'economy' was false and not based upon any kind of reality to give it value. If consumers went out and bought more, it wouldn't fix the economy... it would simply contribute to the illusion.

@ SilentDaeth -
"We can only improve with more knowledge."

Not really... it depends on what we do with knowledge. Knowledge itself is a meaningless pursuit. We could increase our knowledge by 10x and decline rather than improve.

[Archimondera]

I hope there are people have lived on the moon.

[Catinks]

Yet we spend that and much much more on a endless war that will never be won. This is way more important than you think it is. Finding water on the moon could mean that there is possiable life on the moon. Also, if the water is drinkable it is an alternative if we ever do run out of drinking water on the earth. After all less than 1% of all the water on earth is drinkable. Discovering things in our vast universe is worth the 75 million dollars. In fact I would like to see even more being done to discover and explore the things outside of earth.

[SteveW928]

@ Catinks -
"Finding water on the moon could mean that there is possiable life on the moon."

Umm... care to explain this one for me? Since water is one of the most prevalent molecules in the universe, I'd expect we'll find it just about everywhere. I'm not sure what that has to do with life. Earth, btw, is extremely water-poor compared to the norm (even though we might think it has lots from our perspective).

"Also, if the water is drinkable it is an alternative if we ever do run out of drinking water on the earth."

Heh... we'll all be long dead and gone before the moon would be a good alternative source of water.

I'm all for research, but we have to have some good reasons.

[Tezcatlipoca77]

Great we should start colonizing the moon and mine all that Helium 3 and use it as a energy source and also as use the moon as launch pad to mine and colonize other planets or moons.

[SteveLmx]

So it has water and its directly next to a giant ball of iron and water Tell me there's a planet outside our solar system that has water i'll give a crap.

[Shane39199]

i so agree with Tezcatlipoca77 ^_^.this is how space marines began.

[RajabNatshah]

Water on Moon. we need to crate some type of robots to collect the ice water and process it to water. Thank you NASA, ESA, JAXA,......

[omegaron2]

Not content with having destroyed planet earth with pollution, war, pestilence, and pain, **** sapiens now sets his sight on the hapless moon. She'll be divided and subdivided into parcels, excavated, paved, polluted, and eventually destroyed by the same pestilential race of loathsome creatures that have ruined her mother planet, our earth. -- D. Grant Haynes

http://dgranthaynes.blogspot.com/

[Nevermark]

Given that our galaxy has some 500 billion stars presumably with trillions of planets and moons, we would real stick in the muds if we didn't eventually put the moon to good use. Not to mention the 100's of billions of galaxies within viewing distance of us.

This idea that moons or planets without life on them are somehow better being left alone lacks all perspective and imagination. I guess it would have been better for Earth if life had never started here?

We are on the verge of spreading life out into our galaxy. This is a much bigger deal than worrying about whether or not some garbage pits get created on the moon, given they are not harming the environment of any living creatures there.

[15totwelve]

VERY W E L L S A I D.

[RAMSFCFAA]

NASA,
I'll only realize finding the compound of water on moons and planets is great news when private industry pioneers take over the funding of such interests and get it off the backs of every American tax payer. Don't you think, NASA, that this is in the same realm as hell freezing over? What a futile flim-flam return for $79,000,000.00. To only "see" water by instrumentation where we're not and our needs are "now" where we are - - - as we fade away from over taxation for such non-immediate research returns ......

[pentest]

Yeah, that is what is needed. Give science over to incompetent, greedy morons who have no problem destroying the earth and keeping its inhabitants poor, all to make a profit for a few people.

Great idea!

[drtroyyy]

thats good :P:P:P

[richard993]

They will find out 10 years later that the water did not originate from anything else but an alien civilisation that was destroyed in the process of searching for water on the moon. Poor little things didn't even see it coming...

[pillpusher2]

The moon shot looking for water cost $79 million - Where we live there has been water restrictions on or years because of a lack of normal rainfalls. A lot of places on earth are short of water - why not use the money to look for water right here on good old earth? Or, how many RO facilities could be built with some seed money of that amount?

[pillpusher2]

The moon shot cost $79 million looking for water. Where we live there has been water restrictions on for years because of lack of normal rainfalls & population explosion in southern areas. The money should have been used to provide water to areas of earth that are short. How many RO plants could use some of that for seed money?
The gov't is already broke - cut the non-essentials 'til we get the budget under control.

[ThisShows10]

We finally found water! Wouldn't it be interesting if we could experience living on different planets? It may happen someday, but it is unlikely in our lifetime.

[SteveW928]

There is a LOT more involved with life than water...
We'll probably find water just about anywhere we go. That doesn't mean we can live there. What is surprising about the moon is not water, but that there is still water left given the lack of atmosphere to keep it there.

[HeavyJim]

by pentest November 14, 2009 6:43 AM PST
Yeah, that is what is needed. Give science over to incompetent, greedy morons who have no problem destroying the earth and keeping its inhabitants poor, all to make a profit for a few people.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Sounds like the goobermint that is in control now.

[ArmyBrat66]

We have no money to set up any base camp on the moon. And after Neil Armstrong, the first man to walk on the moon, stated recently that he now thinks it was all a hoax done on some NASA soundstage, I think that unless we are needing a lunar base to help us to walk on Mars, we ought to do something less expensive. Nobody with a personal telescope saw this "plume" so we are once again depending on NASA for the truth. What I would like to see is an American Flag unrolled on the surface of the moon - big enough to be seen from earth thru a personal telescope! That would shut the naysayers up for once and for all and the rest of humanity could look up at the moon forever and never doubt who put it there.

[ilsthey]

It's not a flag, but they did leave laser reflectors on the moon. It's not something somebody with a pen light can do at home. But it is well within the means of any small to medium university, business or private organization to fire a laser with enough lumens to reach the moon and back to see it reflect off one of these devices.

Just look up to coordinates of these reflectors, it's public data.

[whilehewill]

Maybe i'm just ill informed, but havn't they been to the moon before. I find it strange that they never found water then if there is so much of it.

[blafouille]

let's go skating...

[AluminumMonster]

Finding water on the Moon will save more then 75 milion dollars it took to find out it was there in the 1st place when colonization missions begin on the Moon. Now they can melt the water there, instead of bringing it from Earth. Im not sure how much it costs to transport 1lbs of material into space, but i believe its around 75000 dollars.

[Earth-1]

This is very interesting and good news since it was suspected that water once did exist there.

moon- tw88dj - nyc