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What a Massive New 728-Foot-Wide Crater Means for Future Moon Bases

26 points · 51 comments · bookofjoe

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bookofjoe · 1790704764 · focus · HN ↗
<a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2026/09/21/science/space/what-a-massive-new-crater-means-for-future-moon-bases.html?unlocked_article_code=1.E1E.p7Sx.xUPQ1BuWlWIb&smid=url-share" rel="nofollow">https://www.nytimes.com/2026/09/21/science/space/what-a-mass...
1. egberts1 · 1790711426 · focus · HN ↗
  Eh, still have to login.
  1. bookofjoe · 1790793097 · focus · HN ↗
    I can only get you so far...
    joe_the_user · 1790819528 · focus · HN ↗
    No,
    You could have gotten this link: <a href="https://archive.is/88rlJ" rel="nofollow">https://archive.is/88rlJ
    bookofjoe · 1790859079 · focus · HN ↗
    Failure acknowledged. The fact I pay $360/year to the Times for a subscription enabling me to provide these gift links here at no charge does NOT excuse me from my inability to have prevent the Times from requiring a log-in to read them.
    FunFact: The Times instituted this requirement to prevent AI/LLM from scraping and stealing its content. Clearly it was remiss.
  2. somenameforme · 1790818550 · focus · HN ↗
    I don't even get that far but get a blank page except for: "Please enable JS and disable any ad blocker." They're doing a pretty good job of minimizing their traffic.
    bookofjoe · 1790861263 · focus · HN ↗
    New York Times 10-Year Online Subscriber Growth
    • 2016: Ended with approximately 1.6 million paid digital-only subscriptions.
    • 2018: Crossed the 3.3 million digital subscriber mark.
    • 2020: Accelerated past 5 million digital subscribers, fueled by intense news cycles (the U.S. election and COVID-19 pandemic).
    • 2022: Surpassed 8.8 million total subscribers after shifting reporting metrics from individual product subscriptions to total unique subscribers and acquiring The Athletic.
    • 2024: Reached over 10.8 million total subscribers by year-end.
    • 2025: Closed the year with 12.78 million total subscribers, adding 1.4 million net digital subscribers over the 12-month period.
    • Mid-2026: Reached 13.35 million total subscribers (including ~12.8 million digital-only subscribers), staying on track for a stated goal of 15 million subscribers by the end of 2027
    Source: <a href="https://www.google.com/search?q=new+york+times+subscription+online+stats+past+10+years&newwindow=1&sca_esv=f6f768f5eb8b4ccf&hl=en&sxsrf=APpeQntWaI_Te9xV3mgbNAnPjyIAZyQBNg%3A1790861069117&source=hp&ei=DV--asuJBZGtiLMP34LsgQk&iflsig=ABILxe8AAAAAar5tHZ39kY6KqdJu9rDsygcq5qlAkz-9&ved=0ahUKEwiLxPWu9ZiXAxWRFmIAHV8BO5AQ4dUDCC4&uact=5&oq=new+york+times+subscription+online+stats+past+10+years&gs_lp=Egdnd3Mtd2l6IjZuZXcgeW9yayB0aW1lcyBzdWJzY3JpcHRpb24gb25saW5lIHN0YXRzIHBhc3QgMTAgeWVhcnMyBxAhGAoYoAEyBxAhGAoYoAEyBxAhGAoYoAEyBxAhGAoYoAEyBxAhGAoYoAEyBRAhGKsCSOOgAVAAWPebAXAKeACQAQCYAbMBoAHjK6oBBTQ4LjE2uAEDyAEA-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&sclient=gws-wiz" rel="nofollow">https://www.google.com/search?q=new+york+times+subscription+...
    somenameforme · 1790863923 · focus · HN ↗
    That didn't pass the sniff test for me, and yeah it's misleading. Not on your part, but theirs - probably to try to appeal to advertisers. See the fine print on their numbers here. [1] Rather than copy-paste a bunch of stuff ctrl+f there for "The Company includes our digital and print products and related businesses, including:". Those numbers are an opaquely combined total across a whole slew of different services, brands, companies, and promotions. Suffice to say they're certainly calculating it in the way that will yield the largest number that's legally defensible.
    [1] - <a href="https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/71691/000007169123000006/nyt-20221231.htm" rel="nofollow">https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/71691/00000716912300...
  3. b0ner_t0ner · 1790819885 · focus · HN ↗
    Bypass Paywalls Clean on Quetta works fine.
metalman · 1790727555 · focus · HN ↗
NASA
free to view, you already paid for it
<a href="https://science.nasa.gov/solar-system/moon/nasas-moon-orbiter-spots-new-once-in-century-moon-crater/" rel="nofollow">https://science.nasa.gov/solar-system/moon/nasas-moon-orbite...
1. peri-cl · 1790821895 · focus · HN ↗
  More photos in one of the papers mentioned,
  <a href="https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/sciadv.aeh7812" rel="nofollow">https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/sciadv.aeh7812
2. rspoerri · 1790851905 · focus · HN ↗
  Nah, i didnt pay for it.
zx8080 · 1790818625 · focus · HN ↗
It means someone will ask 10x price for building the US lunar base.
JKCalhoun · 1790819444 · focus · HN ↗
Archive: <a href="https://archive.ph/88rlJ" rel="nofollow">https://archive.ph/88rlJ
__MatrixMan__ · 1790819921 · focus · HN ↗
In some more enlightened timeline there's a spirited competition between institutional and amateur astronomers towards predicting these, and some amateur is sitting on a $10M this-person-told-us-so-and-we-bet-against-them prize, which gets bigger every year (no prizes for the institutional side, they get a salary).
In that timeline's future we're then competing over who can most reliably prevent them.
The winners of such frivolous competitions over protecting the moon get funding for the more serious job of protecting Earth.
1. JumpCrisscross · 1790823776 · focus · HN ↗
  You could create a lunar grid on a betting market with yes/no contracts for impacts above a certain threshold.
mkl · 1790820061 · focus · HN ↗
> previously unseen lunar crater that’s a whopping 728 feet across, more than twice the length of an American football field.
For the rest of the world, it's about 222m.
> objects the size of monster truck tires
FFS, just use metric! Apparently that's about 1.7m.
1. lubujackson · 1790822427 · focus · HN ↗
  But how many Chevy Tahoes across is it? How many cases of Budweiser high? Speak to me in units I can understand, dammit!
  1. shermantanktop · 1790824050 · focus · HN ↗
    [delayed]
  2. nonethewiser · 1790825104 · focus · HN ↗
    1,510 standard SIG Sauer P365's
Kirr · 1790820189 · focus · HN ↗
> a whopping 728 feet across, more than twice the length of an American football field
For the rest of the world, this is ~222 meters, more than twice the length of a 100 meter track.
EDIT: Ninja'd! :-)
1. kurthr · 1790822290 · focus · HN ↗
  It’s so big we can see it with a telescope, and so small that the chance of something similar hitting any single spot on the surface minuscule in the next 100 years.
  1. ted_dunning · 1790825162 · focus · HN ↗
    But the rate for milligram sized particles hitting a 100m x 100m patch is 2-3 per month.
    At 20km/s, that's plenty big enough to ruin your day.
    aeve890 · 1790826976 · focus · HN ↗
    >At 20km/s, that's plenty big enough to ruin your day.
    Is it though? That's pretty slow
    Edit: nvm I read as km/h not km/s
    LargoLasskhyfv · 1790827242 · focus · HN ↗
    Put a chewing gum in it, push a coin atop it, for a fast fix. Use fantastic fast foam by lunar meta materials for more permanent repair.
    spwa4 · 1790879849 · focus · HN ↗
    That sounds like you would be using your ACME rocket powered roller skates so you get to the damage quickly ...
    LargoLasskhyfv · 1790882064 · focus · HN ↗
    It's the moon. It has low gravity. I'm athletic. I'll just jump.
    spwa4 · 1790946769 · focus · HN ↗
    I wonder how long "coyote time" would last on the Moon.
bigtech · 1790821677 · focus · HN ↗
As with Mars (and Silo) we need a very deep pit to protect humans from the radiation.
npunt · 1790821931 · focus · HN ↗
Basically, moon bases need to be underground to prevent micrometeoroids from messing them up, and any bigger impact like this is going to wipe out anything we build, even underground.
All the more reason Earth is pretty awesome!
Fun fact: moon regolith is made of ~45% oxygen, so in a roundabout way digging underground is kind of like having an atmosphere.
1. JumpCrisscross · 1790823722 · focus · HN ↗
  Or you need really good asteroid defenses.
  1. paimapi · 1790824463 · focus · HN ↗
    that's basically what the moon is for us for most sizes of asteroid (minus very large world ending ones)
    JumpCrisscross · 1790825767 · focus · HN ↗
    > basically what the moon is for us for most sizes of asteroid
    Popular myth. "While the Moon does undeniably experience asteroid impacts, these impacts do not proportionally alleviate the impact risk to Earth; instead, both celestial bodies are subject to independent and interconnected bombardment" [1].
    [1] <a href="https://iere.org/does-the-moon-protect-the-earth-from-asteroids/#Does_the_Moon_Protect_the_Earth_from_Asteroids_The_Cosmic_Shield_Debate" rel="nofollow">https://iere.org/does-the-moon-protect-the-earth-from-astero...
    paimapi · 1790867911 · focus · HN ↗
    good to know, will no longer see the moon as a divine protective demi-god, will only see it as big rock
2. jedbrooke · 1790823881 · focus · HN ↗
  or just build it on the earth facing side of the moon , then you have the entire thickness of the moon shielding you. But I believe some of the more interesting use cases for lunar bases require the far side, notably telescopes
  Edit: this is incorrect, see below
  1. teraflop · 1790826058 · focus · HN ↗
    The lunar near side is not shielded from impact craters in any significant way. Impactors can cross the earth's orbit and hit the near side of the moon just as easily as they can hit the far side.
    The fact that the near side appears to have large areas with few craters, and the far side doesn't, is a result of many near-side craters having been erased by lava flows. It's not because it received fewer impacts.
    jedbrooke · 1790828326 · focus · HN ↗
    Interesting, I did a quick search and you are right. I think I remembered the incorrect fact about the near side being shielded from 2001: A space Odyssey (the book). It actually has a few other outdated moon facts since it was written just before the Apollo missions
3. kazinator · 1790825782 · focus · HN ↗
  [delayed]
hattmall · 1790823443 · focus · HN ↗
Crazy that space is just full of high speed rocks flying around all the time.
karim79 · 1790824434 · focus · HN ↗
Does anyone really want to live on the moon? I mean it's a cool and dreamy idea but would you actually do it?
1. glitchc · 1790824719 · focus · HN ↗
  Life on the moon is likely to develop in much the same way that humans settled in far-flung places on Earth. The first people to arrive and live on the moon will be there for a work-related reason (research, military posting, etc.). Those people will settle down, have families and form a community. Over time, the communities will grow and evolve into a distinct Moon culture and society.
  1. fluidcruft · 1790824995 · focus · HN ↗
    Why hasn't that happened in Antarctica?
    accrual · 1790825230 · focus · HN ↗
    I feel it has in the sense there is an established culture in some major Antarctic research bases. There are stories, communities, and shared history. But most of those on the ice come home after a season or two, so there's no long term settlement of individual families. Maybe this would also be true of moon bases. Researchers stay for some time, then take the next available ferry home once their season lapses. There would have to be significant infrastructure to make "ordinary" life possible over the long term - schools, hospitals, non-research jobs - reasons for staying there versus migrating back to Earth.
    FWIW, there's a nice series of posts about life on the ice here: <a href="https://brr.fyi/" rel="nofollow">https://brr.fyi/
    serf · 1790825323 · focus · HN ↗
    imo the same reason it hasn't happened on the moon, it's not lucrative.
    old world exploration was caused/fueled/triggered/made-possible by opportunity and commerce.
    karim79 · 1790826099 · focus · HN ↗
    It took me some time to dig this up. Here you go and enjoy:
    <a href="https://www.wiffa.aq/?hl=en-GB" rel="nofollow">https://www.wiffa.aq/?hl=en-GB
    glitchc · 1790856356 · focus · HN ↗
    It is, just slowly. We went from having a campsite to building a permanent base.
  2. kazinator · 1790825522 · focus · HN ↗
    [delayed]
  3. OccamsMirror · 1790826396 · focus · HN ↗
    No one is going to raise families on the moon. Why do people believe this crazy nonsense?
    glitchc · 1790856613 · focus · HN ↗
    I'm speaking on a millenium timescale. A millenia ago raising families in America or Australia would sound crazy to the common peasant.
    xnx · 1790868930 · focus · HN ↗
    America and Australia have been inhabited by families for tens of thousands of years.
2. hackeraccount · 1790881590 · focus · HN ↗
  I'll be dead before it's possible but heck yeah. I'd miss going outside. I suspect there'd be annoying compromises on the atmosphere inside the habitat (presumably it'd be like living inside an airliner in that regard).
  On the plus side though - what if they have swimming pools? Swimming around in less then 1G. I would definitely at least visit if they had that.
kazinator · 1790825468 · focus · HN ↗
[delayed]
teraflop · 1790825888 · focus · HN ↗
The article says a new crater this size is expected about once every 132 years. Presumably, smaller craters are more frequent. So what's the approximate size of the largest crater that you'd expect, say, in an average year? And would it be scientifically useful to design a mission around sending a rover to explore one of those brand-new craters?
Kuyawa · 1790826819 · focus · HN ↗
> The impactor would have caused a luminous explosion comparable to one made by 15,500 tons of TNT
Or one hiroshima bomb. Oh wait, nobody to scare here, move along
devsda · 1790827429 · focus · HN ↗
> The impactor would have caused a luminous explosion comparable to one made by 15,500 tons of TNT.
The crater is small enough that it is probably not obvious to spot visually.
But I'm surprised that we missed noticing an impact event of that size when it happened, or even the space object of that size.

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