Scientists have discovered a crater on the moon that’s bigger than the Roman Colosseum and is the result of a powerful impact two years ago that initially went undetected.
The spacecraft gathered more detailed pictures last fall, followed by confirmation of the discovery early this year. The crater – named for the late Thomas McGetchin, a former director of Houston’s Lunar and Planetary Institute – is three times bigger than the previous record-holder found by the LRO a decade ago. The steep-sided hole – about 728 feet (222 meters) across and up to 141 feet (43 meters) deep – is the solar system’s biggest known impact crater carved out in recent times. LRO’s wide-angle images were not identified in the crush of data until August 2025. Pockmarked since ancient times, the moon bears some of the solar system’s largest impact craters, including one that stretches more than 1,500 miles (2,400 kilometers) across.
“This event constitutes a statistically rare, effectively once-in-a-lifetime observation,” the scientists wrote in one of two studies appearing on the subject Wednesday in the journal Science Advances.
Robinson was the lead author for one of the studies. This latest impact churned the lunar surface for more than 66 miles (100 kilometers).
Dust and rocky soil were hurled away at a higher angle than expected, according to Mark Robinson, chief scientist for the LRO’s cameras who works at Intuitive Machines.
