(Nov 25, 2023 05:44 PM)C C Wrote: https://cosmosmagazine.com/space/questions-after-chinese-rocket-debris-slams-into-moon/

EXCERPTS: Last year, an old rocket booster slammed into the Moon after swinging wildly between the Earth and the Moon for seven years. Now analysis of its unusual impact crater reveals this debris was no ordinary piece of space junk.

Something was still attached to it. Something that shouldn’t have been there. China isn’t saying.

A study published in The Planetary Science Journal by mechanical engineers from the University of Arizona California (UAC) says they had been tracking this particular piece of junk for seven years before it slammed into the Moon in March 2022.

And the unusual double crater imprinted on the Lunar surface confirmed their suspicions there was something very odd going on.

[...] space is also increasingly a theatre for international espionage. ... The UAC engineers say they had been analysing the pattern of sunlight reflected from the object as it moved through space.

“In comparing its light curve, they found that it did not wobble the way other boosters did. Instead, something was causing it to tumble in an orderly fashion,” the team says.

“A booster is typically nothing more than an empty shell with a heavy engine affixed to one end. Its asymmetry typically leads to a lot of wobbling. The lack of such a wobble suggested that Chinese engineers had attached something else to the shell opposite the engine, evening out its weight distribution.”

Now, the double impact crater on the Moon proves the Long March 3C booster was carrying a third, undisclosed piece of cargo.

And it’s not just a cause for concern for defence, says Held.

“Eight years ago, nobody cared, which is partly what makes this story interesting,” he said. “Now that we’re starting to care, people are starting to notice the broader effect that we as a species have on our broader solar system. “Big Sky, Little Bullet” is no longer a strategy the industry can afford.” (MORE - missing details)