# Falcon rocket upper stage

Type: Product

Source: Space & Defense Intelligence Brief — https://getspacebrief.com/entity/falcon-rocket-upper-stage
Canonical HTML page: https://getspacebrief.com/entity/falcon-rocket-upper-stage

## 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.
- **2026-08-05**: 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**: 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 (1 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

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