Apollo17 tagged posts

Seismic activity on the moon could pose risk to long-term lunar infrastructure

Apollo 17 astronaut Harrison H. Schmitt samples the boulder at Station 7 located at the base of North Massif in the Taurus-Littrow valley. This large boulder was dislodged by a strong moonquake that occurred about 28.5 million years ago. Credit: NASA/JSC/ASU.

A new paper reveals that ground acceleration from moonquakes, rather than meteor impacts, was responsible for shifting lunar landscapes at the moon’s Taurus-Littrow valley, where Apollo 17 astronauts landed in 1972. The study also pinpointed a possible cause for those surface changes and assessed damage risk using new models of the quakes—findings that may impact the safety of future lunar missions and the establishment of long-term bases on the moon.

The paper, authored by Smithsonian Senior Scientist Emeritus Thomas R...

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