CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. Scientists have confirmed the existence of a cave on the moon near the historic Apollo 11 landing site and believe there could be hundreds more that might house future astronauts.
An Italian-led team reported on Monday that evidence points to a sizable cave accessible from the deepest known pit on the moon, located in the Sea of Tranquility, just 250 miles (400 kilometers) from where Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin landed 55 years ago.
The pit, along with over 200 others found on the moon, was created by the collapse of a lava tube. Researchers used radar measurements from NASA’s Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter and compared the data with lava tubes on Earth. Their findings, published in the journal Nature Astronomy, reveal only the initial part of the underground cavity. They estimate it to be at least 130 feet (40 meters) wide and tens of yards (meters) long, potentially even more.
“Lunar caves have remained a mystery for over 50 years. So it was exciting to be able to finally prove the existence of one,” Leonardo Carrer and Lorenzo Bruzzone of the University of Trento wrote in an email.
According to the scientists, most of the pits are located in the moon’s ancient lava plains. There could also be some at the moon’s south pole, where NASA plans to land astronauts later this decade. Permanently shadowed craters in this region are believed to contain frozen water that could provide drinking water and rocket fuel.
During NASA’s Apollo program, 12 astronauts landed on the moon, starting with Armstrong and Aldrin on July 20, 1969. The new findings suggest there could be hundreds of pits and thousands of lava tubes on the moon. These places could serve as natural shelters for astronauts, protecting them from cosmic rays, solar radiation, and micrometeorite strikes. Constructing habitats from scratch would be more time-consuming and challenging, even considering the potential need to reinforce cave walls to prevent collapse, the team noted.
Rocks and other materials inside these caves, unaltered by the harsh surface conditions over millennia, could also help scientists better understand the moon’s evolution, particularly its volcanic activity.
Gary P Hernal started college at UP Diliman and received his BA in Economics from San Sebastian College, Manila, and Masters in Information Systems Management from Keller Graduate School of Management of DeVry University in Oak Brook, IL. He has 25 years of copy editing and management experience at Thomson West, a subsidiary of Thomson Reuters.
