The constancy of the moon in the night sky belies a more volatile reality, researchers said in new Nasa-funded research.
As the core of Earth’s only natural satellite cools, the moon shrinks, causing it to shrink. This creates ripples tens of meters high, called thrust faults, across the moon’s surface.
In turn, those thrust faults can be the site of hours long moonquakes and landslides, which could endanger humans and robots as humans continue to explore the moon.
“Our modeling suggests that shallow moonquakes that can cause strong ground shaking in the Antarctic region are possible as a result of slip events on existing faults or the formation of new thrust faults,” said Tom Watters of the Smithsonian Institution, lead author of new research published in the Planetary Science Journal.
Researchers have particularly focused on the lunar south pole, a region considered strategically important because scientists believe there may be permanent shadow regions with deposits of water ice. The lunar south pole has already been identified as the focus of Nasa’s Artemis III manned lunar mission scheduled for September 2026.
The moon’s changing surface was captured by the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter camera, which detected thousands of “relatively small, young thrust faults widely distributed in the lunar crust, and seismic devices left on the moon’s surface by astronauts decades ago”. The new research matched these faults with seismic data.
“The global distribution of young thrust faults, their potential to be active and the potential to form new thrust faults due to ongoing global contraction must be considered when planning the location and stability of permanent outposts on the Moon,” Watters said in ‘ said a statement. by Nasa.
Watters later told CNN he didn’t want to “alarm anyone” or “discourage exploration,” but caution future explorers.
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He said, “The moon is not this benign place where nothing happens.”
