Space | A cave was found in the Moon’s Sea of ​​Tranquility – it would be suitable for astronauts’ housing

Major the cave has been found in the middle latitudes of the Moon, in the area of ​​the Sea of ​​Tranquility.

The interpretation of the radar images shows that the cave is more than a hundred meters deep. The width of the cave at its bottom is at least 45 meters.

One hundred meters is so deep that a person would be well protected in a cave from the deadly radiation of space.

So even this first confirmed cave on the Moon could offer humans a permanent base. You could build living quarters there.

However, the cave is probably just one of hundreds yet to be discovered, say geologists studying the Moon.

FROM THE MONTH examine the pictures taken Leonardo Carrer and Lorenzo Bruzzone from the University of Trento, Italy. They also found a cave.

In their search, they used radar images that had already been captured in 2010 from the lunar orbit of a large plain, the Sea of ​​Tranquility. The seas are the basalt plains of the Moon.

The Sea of ​​Tranquility is a familiar name to many people on Earth, because the first spaceflight, Apollo-11, landed on the same large plain. It was the end of July in 1969.

The sea can be seen all the way to the Earth with the naked eye. It is a large patch-like area slightly northeast of the Moon’s equator.

One object in the area examined by the researchers was cavernous. The researchers did not know if the cavity recess had collapsed.

With the help of radar images, Carrer and his team investigated the area of ​​the hole and its interior. They concluded that the cavity actually led to a large cave.

Cavities have been found on the Moon as early as 2009. However, previously it has not been possible to verify whether there are large caves in the Moon’s cavities.

The study about the Moon now in the cave was published science journal Nature Astronomy.

The cave an opening with a diameter of less than a hundred meters is like a skylight on the surface of the Moon.

The opening leads vertically down into the cave. At the bottom, at a depth of more than a hundred meters, there is a sloping rock surface. There the cave expands.

The cave is so deep that the astronauts would have to go down and up with the help of “jet backpacks” or an elevator.

The cave was formed millions or even billions of years ago. Lava flowed on the Moon then. Hot lava also drilled through hard rock.

When the lava dried, the roof of the lava tube could collapse. In this way, a tube-like lava cave is created instead of lava, similar to the ones on earth.

According to researchers, one equivalent is the Lanzarote caves in Spain, where Carrer told the British Broadcasting Corporation for the BBC Italian researchers to their guests.

There are many cavities, pits and “skylights” on the surface of the moon. The US space agency Nasa has found with its probes and devices hundreds of cavities.

Even a network of caves can therefore be hidden under the surface of the moon, he writes New Scientist.

Cave would offer many advantages to the inhabitants of the Moon.

Temperatures on the surface of the moon vary drastically between night and day. At the equator, for example, the temperature varies from a sauna-like 120 degrees to 130 degrees below zero.

In caves, on the other hand, the temperature is much more stable. A steady 17 degrees Celsius has previously been measured downwards from the mouth of the now-discovered cave, he says website Eurekalert.

Space weather and temperature fluctuations do not damage or corrode the rocks in the cave. They could therefore provide a wonderful geological view even going back billions of years.

“We have very precise images of the surface of the Moon. They feature details up to 25 centimeters in size. For example, we can see the landing areas of all the Apollo spaceflights,” said the European Space Agency’s Esa Planetary Caverns researcher Francesco Sauro for the BBC.

“However, we know almost nothing about what lies beneath the surface of the Moon.”

Human is expected to return to the Moon no later than the 2030s, as superpowers the United States and China aim for the Moon.

Residential buildings are already being planned. If more caves are found, they provide shelter. And there is not necessarily that much in the cave annoying, contagious and even toxic moon dust.

Both the United States and China may be hoping that a cave or caves could be found near the Moon’s south pole, as both countries build their bases there.