Two mysterious flashes have been spotted on the moon’s surface, sparking a debate over what just struck our nearest neighbor in the solar system.

Astronomer Daichi Fujii, curator of the Hiratsuka City Museum in Japan, captured the first of these bright flashes on October 30, revealing a large round dot briefly illuminating the moon’s surface before disappearing.

The second flash was spotted two days later, on November 1, near the moon’s horizon from Fujii’s perspective here on Earth.

Currently, the prevailing theory is that these flashes were impacts caused by space rocks from the passing Taurid meteor shower.

This particular meteor shower can be seen every year around late October and early November.

It’s caused by Earth traveling through bits of dust and rock left behind by the debris trail of the comet Encke, creating nights full of harmless shooting stars.

Fujii noted while revealing the mystery flashes that the moon has no atmosphere, meaning we can’t see meteors nearing its surface until they light up at the moment of impact and form a fiery crater.

Fujii added in a post on X that the Taurid meteor shower was currently at its peak when he spotted the bright flashes on the moon.

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Tagged: Space BACK TO HOMEPAGE