SpaceX rocket is about to crash into the moon - here's what we know will happen

Within the next few hours, a SpaceX rocket will collide with the moon - but how did this incident come about?

The upper stage of a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket, launched 19 months ago before unintentionally veering towards the moon, is set to collide with an explosive impact equivalent to three tons of TNT.

Space-tracking expert Bill Gray predicts an impact speed of 5,400mph - seven times the speed of sound - when the object hits near Einstein Crater on the moon's sunlit western limb.

While NASA spokesperson Jimi Russell has said that "there is no danger to Earth" from the impact, eyes around the world will be looking for the moment the spacecraft crashes.

When is it due to crash?

We don't know the exact minute, but the collision is expected to take place at around 2.35am Eastern Time - so around 7.35am in the UK - on Wednesday morning.

Even if it's dark out, the view of the impact flash will be too dim to see the moment of impact. However, it may be visible by telescope for tens of minutes.

The eastern portions of the US and Canada, and much of South America, should have the best views.

What do scientists expect will happen?

Nothing catastrophic, but scientists say the moment of impact will be massive, carving out a crater and sending up a plume of dust and rubble.

NASA's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter and South Korea's Danuri lunar orbiter will gather before-and-after shots of the crash scene.

Another scientist, Benjamin Fernando, from the Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico, echoed this, saying: "The gravity on the moon is low and there is no wind to blow the dust away."

In the aftermath, he anticipates an impact crater nearly 90ft (27m) across and 16ft (5m) deep - too small to see from Earth but visible to spacecraft.

But both said that they aren't too concerned about the impact itself.

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So what are they concerned about?

Concerns are more about the amount of space debris in the Earth's orbit - where, as of July, the European Space Agency suggests there are more than one hundred million pieces of small objects.

Mr Fernando said that "part of the reason for our interest in this event is to figure out how much of a hazard debris impacts pose to future astronauts".

And Mr Gray added: "Things are getting crowded up there."

Detritus from man-made objects falls from orbit on occasion

In October last year, a burning piece of space debris that crashed to Earth was found by mine workers nearly 19 miles east of Newman, Western Australia.

And last May, a car-sized piece of the Soviet rocket Cosmos 482 crashed back to Earth after 53 years in orbit.

What do we know about the rocket?

SpaceX's Falcon 9 is a partially reusable, two-stage rocket - with this specific rocket launched as part of a US and Japanese mission to carry a pair of lunar landers and scientific equipment to the moon last year.

While the concept is to make the rocket reusable and returnable to Earth for future missions, part of the Falcon 9 is shed in orbit, where it remains, unless collided with.

The part on track for the moon is the upper stage of the rocket - about the size of a five-storey building, with a weight on Earth of at least 4,000kg.

Has this happened before?

Yes, SpaceX's Falcon 9 will be the second dead rocket to crash into the moon by accident.

The first came when a Chinese rocket segment dug out a pair of craters on the lunar far side in 2022.

At the time, Mr Gray said it was likely the third stage of a Chinese rocket that sent a test sample capsule to the moon and back in 2014.

Chinese ministry officials said the upper stage had reentered Earth's atmosphere and burned up.

A 2023 study in the Planetary Science Journal said it found "conclusively" that the debris was from China's Long March 3C rocket from a 2014 lunar mission.

(c) Sky News 2026: SpaceX rocket is about to crash into the moon - here's what we know will happen