While we've currently got a comet in the skies, a new space probe going to visit where NASA slammed a little asteroid to see what would happen, a short-term mini-moon, and hopefully a launch to Europa coming up -- this article describes a big hit on the Jovian Galilean moon Ganymede.
"The researcher [planetologist Naoyuki Hirata] found the collision didn’t just reorient the moon; it likely also had a lasting effect on Ganymede’s internal structure. The heat generated by the crash could have influenced the development of the moon’s subsurface ocean, a body of water hidden beneath its icy shell. This ocean is thought to contain more water than all of Earth’s oceans combined, making Ganymede an intriguing target for future exploration.The impact is posited as the cause of the mysterious furrows on part of the moon's surface, some of which are shown below.
“The giant impact must have had a significant impact on the early evolution of Ganymede, but the thermal and structural effects of the impact on the interior of Ganymede have not yet been investigated at all,” Hirata said."
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| Ganymede from the Juno probe |
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