NASA crashes into moon for water research

MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif., Oct. 9 (UPI) -- Two U.S. spacecraft hit the moon Friday, successfully crashing into a crater on the moon's southern axis to test for water ice on the celestial body.

Minutes after the rocket created a hole about 65 feet wide and 10 feet deep in the Cabeus crater, instruments aboard the Lunar Crater Observation and Sensing Satellite analyzed a 6-mile debris plume and sent its observations back to Earth before it also slammed into the same crater, The New York Times reported.

On Earth, scientists at Mountain View, Calif., say they're interested in learning whether water exists in the form of ice in the crater's perpetual dark and cold. The data could play a role in the direction of the space agency's human spaceflight program and whether it should return to the moon or move elsewhere in the solar system.

Data from NASA's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter already confirmed hydrogen is deep within craters near the Moon's poles.

"There is hydrogen down in that crater, and we're going to go dig some of it up," Anthony Colaprete, the mission's principal investigator, said Thursday during a news conference.

While scientists saw the impact generate debris and its data immediately, they said analyzing the information would take several weeks.