Unique Volcanic Complex Discovered On Moon's Far Side

www.sciencedaily.com...

Analysis of new images of a curious "hot spot" on the far side of the Moon reveal it to be a small volcanic province created by the upwelling of silicic magma. The unusual location of the province and the surprising composition of the lava that formed it offer tantalizing clues to the Moon's thermal history.

The hot spot is a concentration of a radioactive element thorium sitting between the very large and ancient impact craters Compton and Belkovich that was first detected by Lunar Prospector's gamma-ray spectrometer in 1998. The Compton-Belkovich Thorium Anomaly, as it is called, appears as a bull's-eye when the spectrometer data are projected onto a map, with the highest thorium concentration at its center.

From what I understand out of the article, the volcano complex is not erupting at the moment. Instead, it erupted a long time ago.

The article says about 3-4 billion years ago, the moon was going nuts with volcanic activity. Then after awhile, this happened.

As the magma ocean cooled, Jolliff explains, elements such as thorium were preferentially excluded from crystallizing minerals, forming pockets of KREEP-rich magma sandwiched between the crust and mantle.

Now for some wild speculation - What if that thorium "hot spot" isnt something related to volcanic activity at all? What if instead, that "hot spot" is a crashed UFO?....or a UFO base !?!?! or a secret government base!?!?!? (just had to throw that out there.)

In all seriousness though, this study will problably make some scientists change some original ideas about the Moon's volcanic history, according to the article.

reply to post by buni11687


Yes i think they are now dormant volcanoes and were possibly active even up to as early as 800 million years ago here.
www.space.com...

Jolliff and his team estimated the age of the moon's rare far side silicate volcanoes to be about 800 million years old. Such an age would extend the volcanic activity of the moon by 200 million years, they said.

It appears John Lear was right all along There was Volcanoes on the moon.