A satellite from South Korea has captured images showing the mark left on the moon after a SpaceX rocket collided with it recently. The mark, visible as a smudge, appears dark in some photos and light in others, near the Einstein Crater on the moon’s surface. The Korean lunar orbiter Danuri, also known as the Korean Pathfinder Lunar Orbiter (KPLO), took images before and after the collision of the SpaceX Falcon 9 upper stage with the moon. The images were captured using the orbiter’s high-resolution Lunar Terrain Imager (LUTI) camera.
The SpaceX rocket’s second stage, launched in January 2025, veered off course after carrying two lunar landers into space and eventually crashed onto the moon on Wednesday at a speed of approximately 8,700 km/hour. Telescopes on Earth observed the plume of debris generated by the crash, confirming the impact even before the satellite images were released.
Danuri was launched aboard a SpaceX rocket in 2022 and has been orbiting around 100 kilometers above the moon’s poles since December of that year. Originally planned for a one-year mission, its operational life has been extended to 2027.
The incident has raised questions about space debris responsibility, prompting scientists to study the impact and emphasizing the need for commercial space companies to manage post-mission debris more responsibly.
