Sometimes a flash in the night is actually an asteroid slamming into the moon.
Because such impacts offer valuable information about Earth's own barrage of space rocks, scientists have established programs that look for the brief bright flashes on the moon that represent lunar impacts. A new such telescope recently began operations, confirming observations of another telescope's 100th impact flash detection.
Having multiple eyes on the moon is valuable for scientists because other phenomena, like satellites passing overhead, can produce similar flashes in the data. But two observatories at different locations won't simultaneously see the same satellite: if both catch the same lunar flash at the same time, it's definitely real data.
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The European Space Agency's Near-Earth Object Lunar Impacts and Optical Transients (NELIOTA) project, based at Kryoneri Observatory in Greece, does just this type of work. So far, the project has spent nearly 150 hours staring at the moon and observed 102 flashes. The instrument can also provide data that lets scientists estimate the temperature of the impact.
The milestone 100th observation came on March 1. And as scientists looked back over NELIOTA's data, they realized that a newcomer to the lunar impact patrol, the Sharjah Lunar Impact Observatory in the United Arab Emirates, had spotted the same flash. Scientists were able to compare images taken by the two observatories and line up lunar features, in addition to checking the timestamps of the flashes.
The double observation marks an important milestone for lunar impact surveillance efforts. "Cross detections like this are very useful as they rule out the possibility of a slow, bright satellite being misidentified as an impact flash," Detlef Koschny, co-manager of the Planetary Defense Office of the European Space Agency, said in a statement.
"While NELIOTA has other, less-direct means of excluding such events, we're excited to have more eyes on the moon, helping us to understand the rocky road our planet travels on," Koschny said. The Earth and moon are close enough — on the scale of the solar system — that both bodies should be hit by more or less the same hail of space rocks.
The flashes these observatories track come from just the sort of space rocks that regularly hit Earth without scientists being able to spot them: rocks that weigh less than 3.5 ounces (100 grams) and are less than 2 inches (5 centimeters) across, according to the statement. Rocks that small don't make it very far into Earth's thick atmosphere before burning away.
But the moon has no such atmosphere, so the same size rock can hit the surface — pretty flashy.
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Email Meghan Bartels at mbartels@space.com or follow her @meghanbartels. Follow us on Twitter @Spacedotcom and on Facebook.
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