Excitement Abounds!

This Friday the Lunar CRater Observation and Sensing Satellite (LCROSS) will plunge into the moon resulting in a fireworks show like none other. Yes, Nasa is plunging testing equipment into a permanently shadowed crater at the moon’s south pole.

The projected impact at the lunar south pole is 4:30am PDT. This is not promising for us CT folks. By 7:30 the sun is definitely rising and will greatly reduce the potential of seeing the impact.

Nasa’s overview reports:

Following four minutes behind, the shepherding spacecraft will fly through the debris plume, collecting and relaying data back to Earth before impacting the lunar surface and creating a second debris plume.

So where’s it going down? In the tiny red dot at the bottom of the moon.

Bang.

Now, my telescope is decent… but it’s not epic. It’s an 8 inch schmidt cassegrain by Celestron. And my best eye-piece… it’s a little foggy. Over at this Nasa page there’s a list of what your telescope will be capable of seeing… and it looks like the event size will be 0.15-0.48% of my viewing field. That’s tiny. The additional brightness of 7:30am is also a bummer.

Either way, keep your fingers Lcrossed* for good weather.

*OH!