Who’s Excited To Bomb The Moon Tomorrow?

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by Steve Krakauer | 10:22 am, October 8th, 2009

» 6 comments

If you haven’t been watching the news recently, you might not know that tomorrow morning we’re going to bomb the Moon. That’s right, the United States is going to unleash some space bombs at 7:30amET – hopefully the Moon people don’t get angry and return fire!

The descriptions of this event is almost as exciting as the event itself.

On CNN this morning, co-anchor Kiran Chetry teased it as, “They’re actually bombing the moon. But it’s to find out about some very, very, very interesting things back here on Earth.”

And on Fox News, co-host Steve Doocy said, “T-minus 24 hours, tomorrow at this time NASA will perform a crash course on the Moon. Take a look at this animation on what’s set tomorrow morning. NASA is sending a rocket that will ultimately crash into the Moon.”

On Morning Joe – well just look at the full screen graphic in the top left.

The main Drudge Report headline about the event is “NASA to bomb the Moon on Friday…”

That Drudge headline links to a Discover magazine story, which explains what’s about to happen, and why, very clearly:

The idea is that over millions and billions of years, a lot of comets have hit the Moon. The water from these comets hits the surface and sublimates away… but if any settles at the bottoms of deep craters near the Moon’s poles, these permanently shadowed regions can act as a refrigerator, keeping the water from disappearing. It can stay there, locked up as ice, for a long, long time. Some estimates indicate there could be billions of tons of ice near the Moon’s south pole.

Detecting that water is tough. Radar results have been inconclusive, with some people saying there’s lots of water, and others saying there’s none at all. By impacting a probe there, any ice located at the impact site will be shot up above the lunar surface, where sunlight will break it up into H+ and OH- molecules, which can be detected. Thus, LCROSS.

Check out NASA’s site on the mission for more information as well. But really, just tune into your favorite news network tomorrow at 7:30amET and watch the U.S. bomb the Moon. Seriously, how great a media story will this be? Space, bombs…if only we could somehow involve Michael Jackson.

Here’s the NASA animation being used on a constant loop on cable news (the good part starts around 1:30):

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LCROSS mission, Moon bombing, NASA

Nachi

It’s good to know these things. Thank you, MEDIAITE. What a sensational way to spend money. We still operate on Missing-Link BushDrunk’s budget for the NIH of $27.5B per year. That includes a total of $5.5B for cancer research per year. The gov’t admits to $17B per MONTH in IRAQ alone. With the Republiscum fight against healthcare, anything else of a nationally/worldly positive nature, we aren’t able to keep up with nosebleeds, let alone treat cancer. And now these highly intellectual, cost-saving moon-bombings! Wail, hit makes a feller reel proud jus ta be a……a……a…Murcuhn!
KiKi

Anti-Science?
Teea

What right do NASA have to bomb the moon? This could seriously effect the earth!! Interestingly, if someone owns that piece of moon has NASA sought permission from them?? Can that person sue NASA?? If people can, as we have been led to believe, land on the moon, why don’t they just send someone there to collect the samples?
m

Did we find oil on the moon?
JunkJunk

Ah, I was really hoping to “Bomb bomb bomb, bomb bomb Iran” before we bombed the Moon…

Aw, hamburgers.
ImNotBlue

Wow… all the Libs object to “bombing the moon.” I wonder why? Was it because it’s “violent?” No. Is it because it’s not “environmentally friendly?” No. Is it because the story mentioned “Drudge” so they’re angry. Probably.

Looking for some water on the moon… interesting stuff. Too bad the “much smarter than you” crowd doesn’t support scientific exploration.