In January 2025, SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket launched with two lunar landers but veered off course. Instead of returning to Earth, its upper stage is now expected to crash into the Moon at about 5,400 miles per hour (8,700 kilometers per hour) on August 5. Bill Gray, an independent analyst who developed the Project Pluto software, has tracked its path and confirmed this.
Gray noted that the situation doesn’t pose a threat. However, it highlights the growing issue of space junk. “It raises concerns about how we manage leftover hardware in space,” he mentioned on his website.
Launch Details
On January 15, 2025, Falcon 9 lifted off from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center. It successfully delivered two landers: Firefly Aerospace’s Blue Ghost and ispace’s Resilience. While Blue Ghost landed safely and captured breathtaking images of a lunar sunset, Resilience unfortunately crashed.
The Falcon 9 upper stage, the part that launched the landers, failed to reenter the Earth’s atmosphere. This was unexpected, as Gray explained that it took a long, lopsided orbit, taking nearly 26 days to circle Earth. It comes as close as 137,000 miles (220,000 km) before drifting out to about 310,000 miles (510,000 km).
Gray noted, “The paths of the Moon and this rocket will cross on August 5.”
Looking Ahead to Impact
Gray predicts that the upper stage will hit near the Moon’s surface, although exact details will be clearer as the date approaches. By then, he expects to have enough data to pinpoint the impact site within a few dozen meters. “We will be fine-tuning the predictions right up to the crash,” he said.
But even if it hits the Moon’s near side, we might not see the impact from Earth. In 2009, NASA sent a rocket to collide with the Moon to search for water ice. However, telescopes could not capture the crash.
This incident serves as a reminder of the increasing challenge of space debris. According to the European Space Agency, there are over 36,500 pieces of debris larger than 10 cm orbiting Earth. This waste can interfere with satellites and pose risks for space missions. In rare cases, debris has reentered Earth’s atmosphere and caused damage.
Gray emphasizes the importance of managing space waste carefully. While the Falcon 9 crash won’t harm the Moon significantly, it’s critical that we find better ways to handle objects we send into space. As he stated, “It’s safer to let space junk hit the Moon than Earth.”
As August 5 approaches, it will be interesting to see how the situation unfolds. Keep an eye on updates as the impact nears.
For more on space debris management, you can read the European Space Agency’s report here.
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Falcon 9,rocket launch failures,SPACEX,the moon
