# Danuri (Korea Pathfinder Lunar Orbiter)

Type: Company

Source: Space & Defense Intelligence Brief — https://getspacebrief.com/entity/danuri-korea-pathfinder-lunar-orbiter
Canonical HTML page: https://getspacebrief.com/entity/danuri-korea-pathfinder-lunar-orbiter

## Timeline

- **2026-08-18**: NASA releases before-and-after imagery — NASA publishes before-and-after photos showing a crater 60 feet (18 m) across and under 10 feet (3 m) deep with butterfly-wing ejecta streaks.
- **2026-08-12**: LRO photographs the crater — NASA's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter images the fresh crater from 60 miles (96 km) up about a week after the collision, once the site rotated into view.
- **2026-08-05T02:35:00-04:00**: Lunar impact — Falcon 9 upper stage strikes the Moon near Einstein Crater at approximately 5,400 mph, creating a fresh 20-30 meter crater.
- **2026-08-05**: Upper stage impacts the Moon — The Falcon upper stage plows into the lunar surface at 5,400 mph (8,700 kph) after drifting through space for more than a year.
- **2025-01**: Falcon 9 launch — Falcon 9 launches from Kennedy Space Center carrying Blue Ghost-1 and Resilience landers on a trans-lunar trajectory.
- **2025-01**: Upper stage depletion and drift — After payload deployment, the upper stage runs out of fuel and begins an uncontrolled chaotic orbit within the Earth-Moon system.
- **2025**: Falcon upper stage launches private Moon landers — A SpaceX Falcon rocket upper stage launches a pair of private lunar landers carrying experiments and a tiny rover under NASA's commercial lunar exploration push.

## Recent coverage (2 stories)

### NASA Reveals 60-Foot Lunar Crater From SpaceX Falcon's 5,400 MPH Impact
2026-08-19 01:53:23 · Sentiment: Neutral · Impact: 5/10 · Sources: 6

NASA's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter captured the sharpest before-and-after views yet of the 60-foot crater a SpaceX Falcon upper stage carved into the Moon at 5,400 mph on Aug. 5. The event doubles as a calibration-grade cratering experiment and a live case study in upper-stage disposal as lunar traffic accelerates.
Full story: https://getspacebrief.com/story/nasa-images-reveal-60-foot-crater-spacex-falcon-lunar-impact

### 5,400 mph SpaceX Debris to Strike Moon Near Einstein Crater Aug 5
2026-08-12 01:09:56 · Sentiment: Neutral · Impact: 5/10 · Sources: 2

An uncontrolled Falcon 9 upper stage will hit the Moon at 2:35 a.m. ET on August 5, offering a rare opportunity to study a known impact as lunar debris management challenges intensify.
Full story: https://getspacebrief.com/story/spacex-falcon9-moon-impact-einstein-crater-2026

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