[meteorite-list] Apollo 13's Booster Impact

[Chris Peterson]

This probably isn't even a "crater" in the usual sense, but more of an 
impact pit. From low lunar orbit, where the Apollo craft were inserted, the 
impact speed will be less than 2600 m/s- probably not even close to what 
would be considered hypervelocity in the sense it is used for cratering, 
given the nature of the lunar surface. So you just do a kinetic energy 
calculation, and get 4.7e10 J or about 11 tons TNT equivalent. The crater 
(or pit) size seems pretty reasonable for that.

Chris

*****************************************
Chris L Peterson
Cloudbait Observatory
http://www.cloudbait.com


----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Meteorites USA" <eric at meteoritesusa.com>
To: "Meteorite-list" <meteorite-list at meteoritecentral.com>
Sent: Saturday, March 27, 2010 1:08 PM
Subject: [meteorite-list] Apollo 13's Booster Impact


> Saw this, though it was cool. But of course I have questions. ;)
> http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/LRO/multimedia/lroimages/lroc-20100322-apollo13booster.html
>
> How fast was it going upon impact? Why is the crater only 30 meters in 
> diameter, while the booster was almost that long? Was the booster not 
> traveling fast enough to make a larger crater? What other factors were in 
> play to create the crater, material the booster was made of, size, weight, 
> speed, angle of descent, all of the above?
>
> Regards,
> Eric Wichman