On Thursday September 17, 2009, pictures from NASA's new moon orbiter, LRO (Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter), successfully completed the testing and calibrating part of its mission and moved on to mapping the orbit of the moon. The LRO's materials made measurements of space radiation in the lunar environment and found areas of possible signatures of water. The LRO's LEND (Lunar Exploration Neutron Detector) showed shadowed regions that could potentially be the place of water ice and hydrogen. LEND needs a decrease of neutron radiation from the lunar surface to tell whether or not there is water or hydrogen. A big finding from it is that the hydrogen isn't only in one spot, and the team members on this discovery want to know more about it.
This spacecraft launched on June 18, 2009 and should keep working for a year. As of right now it is in good shape. The main goal of this exploration was to find landing spots for astronauts to land in the future, and to make a map of the moons surface, temperature extremes, and radiation environment. Now, it will also be looking for water ice in the permanently shadowed craters of the moon's south pole. If they find water ice, it will be good for the astronauts because they could melt it for water, and they could extract the hydrogen and use it for fuel. However, some of the maps show steep crater slopes that would be difficult for a truck or car to drive over, so that could create a set back for getting the water ice in the craters. On September 9th the LRO will land on the moon's south pole to get debris samples that will be used for future results.
This spacecraft launched on June 18, 2009 and should keep working for a year. As of right now it is in good shape. The main goal of this exploration was to find landing spots for astronauts to land in the future, and to make a map of the moons surface, temperature extremes, and radiation environment. Now, it will also be looking for water ice in the permanently shadowed craters of the moon's south pole. If they find water ice, it will be good for the astronauts because they could melt it for water, and they could extract the hydrogen and use it for fuel. However, some of the maps show steep crater slopes that would be difficult for a truck or car to drive over, so that could create a set back for getting the water ice in the craters. On September 9th the LRO will land on the moon's south pole to get debris samples that will be used for future results.
This article is interesting because if there is water found on the moon, it is a huge discovery for future explorations to the moon. If there is water, it could be very useful to the mission and to the astronauts because having water on the moon would mean that the astronauts wouldn't need to bring it with them, so then they would have room for something else that they might need.
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