The Moon’s surface is pockmarked with more than 200 known pits where rocks and regolith collapsed into depths unknown. New research has found that one of those pits, in Mare Tranquillitatis, collapsed into a lava tube and made an underground cave conduit accessible from the lunar surface.
“We found a sort of front door to enter the subsurface,” said Leonardo Carrer, a planetary scientist at the University of Trento, Italy, and first author on the research. Its access to the otherwise shielded lunar subsurface makes this pit a tantalizing site for future human and robotic exploration and could provide new insight into lunar volcanism.
“We found a sort of front door to enter the subsurface,” said Leonardo Carrer, a planetary scientist at the University of Trento, Italy, and first author on the research. Its access to the otherwise shielded lunar subsurface makes this pit a tantalizing site for future human and robotic exploration and could provide new insight into lunar volcanism.
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