A feature the size of a small country carved in minutes
Near the Moon's south pole, two ancient canyons stretching nearly 280 kilometers and plunging over three kilometers deep stand as silent monuments to a moment of cosmic violence so brief and so absolute that human timescales struggle to contain it. Scientists have determined that a single impact, releasing energy 130 times greater than Earth's entire nuclear arsenal, carved these valleys in under 16 minutes — a geological instant that reshaped a world. In studying these preserved scars, researchers find not only a record of the Moon's past, but a mirror reflecting the catastrophic forces that have shaped life and extinction on Earth itself.
- A single asteroid or comet struck the Moon with enough force to dwarf 700 times the combined yield of every nuclear test in human history, carving twin canyons in less time than it takes to watch a film.
- The Schrödinger and Planck valleys — each nearly 280 km long and up to 3.5 km deep — appeared in a geological blink, upending assumptions about how quickly a landscape can be permanently transformed.
- Because the Moon lacks the erosion and tectonic activity that have blurred Earth's own ancient scars, these canyons survive as an almost perfectly preserved record of planetary-scale violence.
- Scientists are now reading these lunar wounds as the closest available analog to the Chicxulub impact that ended the dinosaurs, offering rare clarity into the mechanics of extinction-level events.
- NASA's designation of the Moon's south pole as a priority zone for crewed missions means astronauts may one day stand at the edge of these canyons, conducting research that bridges cosmic history and humanity's future in space.
Two enormous canyons near the Moon's south pole — the Schrödinger Valley and the Planck Valley — were carved by a single catastrophic impact powerful enough to dwarf 130 times Earth's entire nuclear arsenal detonated at once. Stretching 270 to 280 kilometers and plunging up to 3.5 kilometers deep, they formed not over eons but in somewhere between 4.9 and 15.4 minutes. Where the Grand Canyon required millions of years of patient erosion, the Moon's twin scars appeared before the dust had settled.
The energy released exceeded the combined force of every nuclear test ever conducted by the United States, the Soviet Union, and China by a factor of 700. The collision was not merely destructive — it was transformative on a planetary scale, hurling rock outward in straight radiating lines from the Schrödinger basin and permanently rewriting the lunar landscape in a single violent moment.
What makes these canyons especially valuable is the Moon's geological stillness. Unlike Earth, where plate tectonics and weathering have obscured ancient impact sites, the Moon preserves its scars with extraordinary fidelity. Researchers see in these formations the best available surface analog for understanding the Chicxulub crater — the Mexican impact site linked to the extinction of the dinosaurs 66 million years ago. Studying the Moon's wounds offers insight into how such collisions reshape worlds and drive mass extinction.
Published in Nature Communications in 2025, the findings also carry forward-looking significance. NASA has identified the Moon's south pole as a priority destination for future crewed missions, and these canyons — billions of years old yet still legible — will serve as both scientific laboratories and stark reminders of the cosmic forces that continue to move through our solar system.
Two massive scars cut across the Moon's surface near its south pole—the Schrödinger Valley and the Planck Valley—and scientists have now determined they were carved by a single impact so violent that it would take 130 times Earth's entire nuclear arsenal, detonated simultaneously, to replicate the force. The canyons stretch 270 to 280 kilometers in length and plunge 2.7 to 3.5 kilometers deep. They were formed in minutes, not eons.
On Earth, the Grand Canyon took millions of years to take shape, its walls slowly exposed by water and time. The Moon's twin canyons appeared in a geological blink—somewhere between 4.9 and 15.4 minutes, according to the research. In that brief window, an asteroid or comet struck with such ferocity that it fundamentally reshaped the lunar landscape, hurling vast quantities of rock outward in straight lines radiating from a central point within the Schrödinger basin. The violence was so complete, so immediate, that it left the Moon's surface transformed before the dust had fully settled.
The energy released by this collision dwarfs any comparison to human weapons. It exceeded the combined force of every nuclear test ever conducted by China, the United States, and the Soviet Union by a factor of 700. Against the current global nuclear arsenal—the accumulated destructive capacity of every warhead on Earth—the impact was 130 times more powerful. To understand the scale: this was not a regional catastrophe. This was a planetary-scale event that happened to occur on another world.
The location of these canyons has drawn particular attention from the scientific community and space agencies. They sit near the Moon's south pole, in a region that NASA has designated as a priority zone for future crewed lunar missions. The proximity is not coincidental in terms of scientific interest. The Moon, geologically dormant compared to Earth, has preserved these impact scars with remarkable fidelity for billions of years. They function as a natural archive of cosmic violence, their features still legible to modern instruments.
Scientists see in these lunar canyons a window into Earth's own catastrophic past. The Chicxulub crater in Mexico's Yucatán Peninsula, formed roughly 66 million years ago by the asteroid impact that ended the age of dinosaurs, left its mark on a geologically active world. Erosion, plate tectonics, and weathering have obscured much of what that impact looked like in its raw form. But the lunar canyons offer what researchers call the best surface analog for understanding Chicxulub—a preserved record of what such a collision actually does to a landscape. By studying the Moon's scars, scientists gain insight into the mechanisms of extinction-level impacts and the geological upheaval they trigger.
The research, published in Nature Communications in 2025, reinforces a broader picture of the early solar system as a place of relentless bombardment. Planets, moons, asteroids, and comets collided with one another in a chaotic dance that shaped the worlds we see today. The canyons near the Moon's south pole are not anomalies; they are evidence of the norm in a younger, more violent cosmos.
For future lunar missions, the findings carry practical weight. Understanding the composition of soil shaped by such extreme impacts, and assessing the risks posed by ongoing cosmic collisions, will be essential as humans return to the Moon. The canyons themselves—monuments to destruction billions of years old—will serve as both scientific laboratories and reminders of the forces that continue to move through space.
Citas Notables
The lunar canyons represent the best surface analog for understanding the Chicxulub crater and the mechanisms of extinction-level impacts— Research team, Nature Communications (2025)
La Conversación del Hearth Otra perspectiva de la historia
When you say the impact happened in minutes, are we talking about the actual collision itself, or the time it took for the canyon to fully form?
Both, really. The collision itself was instantaneous, but the excavation—the process of material being ejected and the canyon walls collapsing into their final shape—took somewhere between 5 and 15 minutes depending on which valley you're looking at. It's almost incomprehensible. On Earth, we think in terms of geological time. Here, a feature the size of a small country was carved in the time it takes to boil water.
And the energy comparison to nuclear weapons—is that just a way to make it dramatic, or does it actually tell us something useful?
It's useful because it gives scale to something our brains can't really grasp otherwise. We understand nuclear weapons. We know what they do. Saying this impact was 130 times more powerful than every warhead on Earth right now—that lands differently than just saying "a lot of energy." It forces you to reckon with the fact that the solar system is capable of violence we can barely imagine.
Why does this matter for understanding the dinosaur extinction?
Because Chicxulub happened on a living, moving planet. Plate tectonics, erosion, water—they've all worked to erase the evidence. But the Moon doesn't have those processes. The canyons there are pristine. They show us what a world actually looks like after being hit by something that big. That's invaluable for understanding what happened to Earth 66 million years ago.
And NASA wants to send people to this region?
Yes. It's strategic for multiple reasons. The south pole has water ice, which is crucial for long-term habitation. But now we also know it's a region shaped by one of the most violent events in the solar system's history. That makes it both scientifically rich and, in a way, humbling. The astronauts will be walking on a landscape carved by forces we're only beginning to understand.