SpaceX rocket thought to have crashed into the moon in unintentional collision

A four-tonne piece of a discarded SpaceX rocket that has been floating in space since last year is believed to have unintentionally crashed into the moon at high speed, in a collision that posed no danger to Earth but was expected to blast out a new lunar crater.

The object, the height of a five-storey building, was part of the SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket that launched two commercial lunar landers, one from the US and one from Japan, towards the moon in January 2025.

The rocket body ⁠was due to hit the moon about 6.35am BST, crashing into its surface at 5,400mph (8,690 km/h). The impact was predicted to kick up a miles-long plume of lunar dust that, although illuminated by sunlight, would be difficult ⁠to spot with the naked eye from Earth.

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How did Musk miss that shot?