Asteroid impacts of various scales pose a threat to human infrastructure on the Moon because there is no protective atmosphere. Observations of fresh craters and impact flashes on the Moon prove that impacts are not just hypothetical events. Direct impacts, and material ejected from craters, pose a risk to lunar infrastructure. Fast ejecta travelling at velocities up to several km/s can cause critical damage at large distances far away from the primary impact location. In this project, we develop an ejecta model for individual impacts, and we estimate the risk for different types of lunar infrastructure for a given impact flux over time.
The AI-generated image above shows the process of crater formation and the hazard that arises from the material ejected from the crater.
This Project is one of the Planetary Defence related activities of Museum für Naturkunde.
