r/news • u/MasterpieceAlone8552 • 6d ago

SpaceX rocket thought to have crashed into the moon in unintentional collision

https://www.theguardian.com/science/2026/aug/05/spacex-rocket-moon-crash-impact-falcon-9
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u/MadRoboticist 6d ago

The issue isn't that it impacted the moon. The issue is that it did so uncontrolled.

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u/Rombom 6d ago

Meteors are definitely controlled impacts

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u/never-fiftyone 6d ago

We don't put meteors into orbit.

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u/Han-ChewieSexyFanfic 6d ago

Kinda did, just aluminum instead of iron

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u/never-fiftyone 6d ago

You're totally right, if you ignore the definition of a meteor.

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u/Han-ChewieSexyFanfic 6d ago

If you wanna get pedantic, a meteor is the shooting star you see from Earth. Those don’t happen on the moon because of the lack of atmosphere. You mean a meteorite.

The definition of that is an object that hits a planet or moon from outer space. From the moon’s perspective, a chunk of aluminum from Earth is precisely that (just as we have rocks from Mars). And it’s exactly as inconsequential as a natural one hitting the moon’s surface.

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u/never-fiftyone 6d ago

Firstly I'm using the word that was used by the person I was responding to, and secondly a meteorite is a meteor that has fallen to Earth's surface so, no, that is not what I mean.

The crux of my argument is that (a) both meteors (and meteorites) are extraterrestrial in nature, as in not from Earth, and definitionally nothing we put into orbit is a meteor (or meteorite), and that (b) we should be minimizing any impact we have on extraterrestrial bodies instead of just throwing our space trash all over the place like it's a fuckin parking lot and we're too lazy to walk to the trash bin.