As we approach the peak of the Geminid meteor shower on Friday (December 13) night, the sky is starting to light up with an impressive array of meteors slamming into Earth’s atmosphere. But Earth isn’t the only target; the moon is regularly bombarded by such meteors, and Daichi Fujii, director of the Hiratsuka City Museum in Japan, captured some of the recent collisions.
Fujii documents meteor impact moon Twice on December 6, 2024, December 7, and December 8, 2024, using cameras monitoring Earth’s nearest neighbor. You can watch some of his moon impact footage (as well as some impressive fireballs) at His X account.
“Another lunar impact flash occurred tonight. I captured it at home at 360fps (slow playback) on 8 December 2024 at 22:34:35 and was able to confirm it with multiple telescopes. Bright meteor Fireballs appear every day, but lunar impact flashes are also captured one after another.
Another lunar impact flash occurred tonight. It was captured at 360fps (slow playback) at home on December 8, 2024 at 22:34:35, and confirmed through multiple telescopes. Bright meteors and fireballs are streaming in every day, and lunar impact flashes are constantly being captured. pic.twitter.com/iHUq9EuXQgDecember 8, 2024
This isn’t the first time Fujii has witnessed such an impact. exist In February 2023, he recorded another impressive video A scene of a meteor hitting the moon.
Related: Geminids 2024: When, where and how to see one of the best meteor showers of the year
It’s unclear whether the lunar impact recently captured by Fujii was Geminid meteor shower Or just the result of sporadic meteors. When asked about the possible source of these meteors, Robert Lunsford of the American Meteor Society said: Tell the earth and the sky, “While it is too early to see strong Geminid meteor activity, these are likely Geminid meteors because they hit the Moon from the expected direction.”
Lunsford said that if they were indeed the Geminids, the frequency of impacts on the moon is quite alarming because even during the Geminid maximum, no more than one visible impact event was seen per night.
Moon impact flash appears after Saturn eclipse! Filmed at home on 8 December 2024 19:41:33 at 620fps and using multiple telescopes (slow playback). Since the moon has no atmosphere, meteors are not visible and only shine when craters are formed. Although the data is still being compiled, flashes were also confirmed at 17:26:27 on the 6th and 18:03:06 on the 7th. pic.twitter.com/QPmgJVMgQlDecember 8, 2024
Given the Moon’s history of being struck by Geminid meteors, it’s likely that at least some of the meteor strikes were Geminids. 2015, NASA published a study Observations of lunar impacts by the Geminid meteor shower found 19 such impacts in 2006 and 21 in 2010. .
However, Fujii did not rule out the possibility that they were just sporadic meteors. “Given the location of the radiant, it is possible that these lunar impact flashes are related to the Geminids,” Fujii told EarthSky. “However, since the number of sporadic meteors in ground-based meteor observations is still greater than the Geminids, they are likely to be sporadic meteors.”
Why do impacts look like bright flashes?
Since the moon has almost no atmosphere, when an object hits the moon, it travels at high speeds with nothing to slow it down. When a meteoroid collides with the moon, much of the energy from the impact is converted into heat and creates craters. However, a small amount of energy is released in the form of visible light, producing a bright flash at the collision site, According to NASA
If you’d like to keep tabs on our lunar companion, check out our Moon Appreciation Guide. Looking for some new gear? our Guide to the Best Telescopes and Guide to the Best Binoculars is a good starting point.