China accused of hitting Moon with ‘secret payload’ by US scientists as signs of 1,000lbs of wrecked equipment found
US astronomers believe that a Chinese rocket crashed a payload into the Moon's surface last year.
In a new study, US researchers “conclusively” identified that Chinese space junk blasted two craters into the Moon's surface.
In October 2014, China's Chang'e-5 T-1 experimental spacecraft embarked on its journey into space.
The craft was propelled by a three-stage Long March 3C rocket from the Xichang satellite launch center in southwestern China.
Years later, in March 2022, a team of researchers found that the rocket's upper stage had crashed into the moon's surface.
This left behind a mysterious double crater, measuring between 52 feet and 59 feet that has sparked questions about undisclosed payload.
“You would expect it to wobble a little bit, particularly when you consider that the rocket body is a big empty shell with a heavy engine on one side,” according to Tanner Campbell, a doctoral student at the University of Arizona and the study’s first author.
“But this was just tumbling end over end, in a very stable way,” Campbell said in a statement released by the university.
This means that the rocket booster must have had a large object(s) at the top end to balance the two engines, South China Morning Post explained.
This mysterious mass would have needed to weigh about 1,200 pounds each – without fuel.
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However, the only two known instruments on the booster weighed about 59 pounds, according to Campbell.
"To get those two craters of about the same size, you need two roughly equal masses that are apart from each other," Campbell said.
"Obviously, we have no idea what it might have been – perhaps some extra support structure, or additional instrumentation, or something else. We probably won’t ever know," he said.
The findings illuminate the need to keep an eye on the growing number of space junk.
They emphasized that space debris poses a growing threat to future space missions.