Maybe you remember getting up early on Friday, October 9, 2009, to see the LCROSS spacecraft and its spent 13-meter (42-foot) long, 2.2-ton Centaur rocket booster wallop the lunar crater Caleus near the southern pole of the Moon.

And, nothing happened! No 20-kilometer (12-mile) high plume of dirt and debris! No visible signs of two impacts four minutes apart! Not even one impact! Nothing as far as we could see!

Excitement had been high that a dramatic scene would unfold on the Moon, which could be witnesses by people on Earth. One such article, publicizing the dramatic event, was Space.com's “NASA Set to Dive Bomb the Moon.”

So, disappointment was widespread from spectators and NASA scientists alike even though the experiment did seem to be successful; that is, except for any visible signs of the double impacts.

At that time, some NASA scientists contended that Centaur had impacted bedrock (the solid rock underlying the lunar surface) rather than the loose layer of rock particles (called regolith) that covers most of the Moon’s surface.

However, NASA is now reporting that the plume did occur.

According to the October 17, 2009 Los Angeles Times article “NASA moon crash did kick up debris plume as hoped,” NASA scientists at the NASA Ames Research Center in Mountain View, California, have developed images that show a 1.6-kilometer (one-mile) high plume from the first impact—that of the Centaur rocket.

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The LA Times article contains a nice image of the Cabeus crater only seconds after the impact of the rocket—which shows the plume visible above the crash site.

And, the October 16, 2009 NPR article “Next Stop: The Moon” quoted NASA LCROSS project scientist Anthony Colaprete as saying, “I can certainly report there was an impact. We saw the impact. We saw the crater. And we got good measurements, spectroscopic measurements — which is what we needed — of the impact event."

NASA scientists are now saying that the slow speed (about 5,600 miles per hour) of the Centaur rocket resulted in the smaller altitude of the debris plume, which resulted in it not being seen on the morning of the crash.

However, enhanced composite images released by NASA on Friday, October 16, 2009, show a faint plume that was not visible on the earlier un-enhanced pictures we saw on the morning of the crash.

These newly released images show that a new crater on the Moon, made artificially by humans from the rocket, is about 28 meters (92 feet) wide.

It is still not known whether the plume contained any water—which is the primary reason for the destruction of the Centaur rocket onto the lunar surface.

The images of the resulting plume of debris from the LCROSS spacecraft are still being analyzed by NASA scientists to see if water was present, along with other materials.

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Mission managers on the mission of the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO), the mother ship to LCROSS, indicated that its spacecraft imaged the crash site.

Although it did not detect water in the plume, it did find signs of mercury and iron.

However, NASA scientists are saying that the data so far returned from the double-impact of the Moon by LCROSS and Centaur has been significant.

The LA Times report that the “Scientists are ‘blown away by the data returned.”

For additional information on the LCROSS/Centaur impacts on the Moon, go to the NASA LCROSS website for coverage on the mission.

The lead story on the NASA LCROSS website "NASA'S LCROSS Captures All Phases of Centaur Impact" begins by stating, "NASA’s Lunar CRater Observation and Sensing Satellite (LCROSS) was a smashing success, returning tantalizing data about the Centaur impact before the spacecraft itself impacted the surface of the moon."

"Last week, plunging headlong into Cabeus crater, the nine LCROSS instruments successfully captured each phase of the impact sequence: the impact flash, the ejecta plume, and the creation of the Centaur crater."