Incoming! SpaceX Falcon 9 Rocket on Collision Course With the Moon

This rendered a deorbit burn to dispose of it in our planet’s atmosphere impractical, while the upper stage also lacked sufficient velocity to escape the Earth-Moon system. Instead, it was left in a chaotic Sun-orbiting orbit near the two bodies.

Now credible public estimates forecast its impact with the Moon on March 4, 2022, at 12:25:39 UTC at a point on the lunar far side near the equator. Follow-up observations should sharpen the

There are locations around a planet’s orbit where the gravitational forces and the orbital motion of the Sun and planet interact to create a stable location, from where a spacecraft can reside with little effort from the operators on the ground to keep it in place. These points are known as Lagrangian or ‘L’ points, after the 18th century Italian astronomer and mathematician Joseph-Louis Lagrange (born Giuseppe Luigi Lagrancia). Credit: ESA