LADEE Moon quake?

[Frida Space]

Hi everyone, a few days ago NASA released the first photos of LADEE's moon impact, which occured in April. I was wondering if LADEE's impact generated some moon-quake or something like that. A few considerations:

1) LADEE had a mass of 383 kg and impacted the moon at 1700 m/s. If my calculations are correct, the kinetic energy released would be of about 553,435,000 J. On Earth, it would be just less than a 3 Richter magnitudine earthquake. Would it be the same on the moon, or would it be more/less powerful?

2) The impact occured on the far side of the moon for safety reasons. All of the Apollo seismographs lie on the opposite side. Do you think they could have registred a quake of some sort?

Finally, something similar happened with Apollo 13's third stage, which crashed just 134 km from Apollo 12's seismograph. According to my calculations, the energy released was about 81 times the one of LADEE. Being so powerful and so close, the seismographs recorded something like a 3-hour-long moonquake, if I recall correctly.

I was also wondering what calculation is needed in order to determine the duration of the quake. Thanks!

[Kryten]

The Apollo seismographs were all deactivated in 1977.

[Frida Space]

The Apollo seismographs were all deactivated in 1977.

Thanks! Didn't know that. But do you know if the LADEE impact created any kind of quake?

[dharak1]

My guess is that the "moonquake" would last longer because the energy wouldn't be able to leave through an atmosphere. The moon also has a lower density so the energy wouldn't be able to move through the ground as easily. Just a guess though.