Tomorrow morning (Friday), around 6.30AM Austin time, two spacecraft are going to (purposefully) slam into the surface of the moon!  This is part of a science experiment to analyze the chemical composition of the dust that lies in on the moon — specifically to see if there is water.  The impact is going to be in a “permanently shadowed crater” that has been found to have a “concentrated hydrogen signature”.  Permanently shadowed means that the sun does not shine there because of the crater wall shielding it from the sun and the specifics of the moon’s orbit. See the mission overview for more information.

Below is a picture of craters in the area that were analyzed as candidates for study. The colors represent an analysis of “age, depth, and structure of the selected craters.”

Photo from NASA’s LCROSS website.