** Moon’s Largest Crater Formation Mystery Solved – NASA Artemis Landing Implications
** Scientists discovered the Moon’s largest crater resulted from a glancing impact rather than direct hit. This finding transforms NASA’s Artemis landing strategy and reveals new insights about lunar evolution. The research provides crucial context for upcoming human missions to the lunar south pole. **CONTENT:**
NASA’s Artemis program is heading toward a surprisingly different lunar landing site than originally planned, thanks to groundbreaking research about the Moon’s largest crater formation. According to a new study published in Nature, the South Pole-Aitken basin—the massive 1,200-mile crater where astronauts are scheduled to land—was created by a glancing, southward asteroid impact rather than the direct collision scientists had assumed for decades. This revelation has “important implications” for how NASA will approach its first crewed lunar landing in over 50 years and what scientists hope to discover about the Moon’s geological history.