NASA thinks the moon's underground caves could house astronauts

[Buster's Uncle]

NASA thinks the moon's underground caves could house astronauts
The Verge
By Arielle Duhaime-Ross on July 18, 2014 12:04 pm Email @ArielleDRoss
 





The moon's surface isn’t just full of craters — it’s also full of holes. And according to NASA, these holes, and the underground caves to which they connect, could one day provide shelter to the space agency’s astronauts.
 
The moon’s more than 200 holes, or "lunar pits," were discovered by NASA’s Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter, reports Motherboard. These pits range in size from about 5 meters in diameter to more than 900 meters, and were likely formed when part of the moon’s surface collapsed over a cave. And the caves themselves may have been formed by ancient lava streams, NASA says.



"A habitat placed in a pit... would provide a very safe location."


"A habitat placed in a pit — ideally several dozen meters back under an overhang — would provide a very safe location for astronauts: no radiation, no micrometeorites, possibly very little dust, and no wild day-night temperature swings," said Robert Wagner, one of the Arizona State University researchers who helped discover the holes, in a statement.

Now that NASA has identified these caves, researchers are hoping to explore them. And according to Wagner, the best way to do so is to drop a probe into the holes. The pits, he explained, "cannot be explored very well from orbit."

In the meantime, however, Wagner and his team will continue to scan images of the moon’s craters to identify more pits. This may be difficult because "for about 25 percent for the moon’s surface area (near the holes) the sun never rises high enough for our algorithm to work," Wagner said. So, improving search algorithms may prove critical if we ever want to house astronauts on — or in — the moon.


http://www.theverge.com/2014/7/18/5915743/nasa-moons-underground-caves-could-house-astronauts

[Buster's Uncle]

NASA says lunar caves could provide living spaces for future astronauts
Engadget
BY Timothy J. Seppala  @timseppala  7 hours ago



Image credit: Associated Press



It turns out that the Moon could be habitable. Sort of. NASA writes that some of the holes in our moon's surface might actually be caves where future astronauts could hole up and guard themselves from radiation, micrometeorites and massive temperature changes when day turns to night, aiding future exploration. The aeronautics outfit says that these caves could be the result of a few different actions, including sub-surface lava draining away from an area and vibrations causing the roofs of resultant voids to collapse. The only way to know for sure, though, is to physically check them out -- there's only so much that photos from NASA's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter can tell us. Who knows, maybe once astronauts start delving below the lunar surface they'll find a wizard or two.

NASA | Peeking Into Lunar Pits

http://www.engadget.com/2014/07/19/habitable-lunar-caves/?ncid=rss_truncated