[dramatic percussion music]
Hey, welcome to NASA Launchpad! I'm your host Vince Whitfield. What's one of the biggest necessities
for survival here on Earth? I'll give you a hint. About 70 percent of the planet is covered in it.
That's right! Water. So, what do you think will be an important commodity as we send astronauts back to
the Moon? You catch on quick. Yeah - water. And you know it's not just for drinking, it also needs
to be used for food preparation and cooling electronic equipment. And think about this
when astronauts head back to the Moon they're going to be staying there for a while.
And I don't know about you, but I wouldn't want to be hanging out with a group of people
in an enclosed space for an extended period of time when we couldn't take showers.
But water's also pretty heavy with a mass of about one kilogram per liter. There's a limit to how much
stuff astronauts can take with them as they go into space. Hm. Wouldn't it be nice if there was
already water waiting for them out there? And that brings us to LCROSS, the Lunar Crater Observation
and Sensing Satellite. Its mission is to search for water on the Moon. It's a pretty exciting mission.
So exciting in fact that John Marmie, LCROSS Deputy Project Manager, was inspired to write
a song about it and it's called, fittingly enough, "Water On the Moon." Take a listen but
pay close attention because the lyrics kind of tell the story of LCROSS. 5..4..3..2..1
♪
♪ signs are in the universe ♪
♪ drifting out in space ♪
♪ somewhere beyond the darkness lie the answers to the human race ♪
♪ stars shining in the galaxy will we see them face to face? ♪
♪ I don't know what lasts a month but ♪
♪ Curiosity will lead the way. I wanna go faster, faster and in the air we're gonna crash. ♪
♪ Galileo through the looking glass. Oooh. ♪
♪ Like finding water on the Moon. ♪
♪
♪ What a wonderous sense of destiny. ♪
♪ Be the first to step foot on Mars. ♪
♪ I wanna go faster, faster and in the air we're gonna crash ♪
♪ by Galileo through his looking glass ♪
♪ that's for reason our dreamer's eyes are gazing into a sense of purpose from our view ♪
♪ like finding water on the Moon. ♪
♪
♪ I wanna go faster, faster ♪
♪
♪ Water on the moon ♪
There you go. That was performed by John Marmie and Jeff Petro.
Catchy lyrics huh? Too bad my textbook isn't written in songs.
I might actually enjoy cracking books.
Now after listening I know you're probably bubbling with questions. What would finding water on the Moon mean?
How could we use that water? Would lunar water be the same as water here on Earth? Good questions.
But they're going to have to wait. Keep checking back. We'll have more info on LCROSS soon.
Until then, I'm Vince Whitfield. Cheers for watching NASA Launchpad.
[dramatic percussion music]