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The moon was made in a matter of hours, not years.

This natural satellite’s beginnings are still a mystery that hasn’t been fully explained.

New research suggests that the moon was launched into orbit right away following a massive collision between Earth and Theia, a body the size of Mars.

The moon was formed within hours as material from the Earth and Theia was sent immediately into orbit after the impact, stated the highest-resolution models of the dramatic event yet produced by Durham University’s Institute for Computational Cosmology.

They created simulations using supercomputers to learn more about the Moon’s 4.5 billion-year history. Hundreds of collisions at various impact angles, speeds, etc., were conducted through the simulations using SWIFT open-source code.

The research was published in The Astrophysical Journal Letters, massive impacts can instantly launch a satellite with a mass and iron composition comparable to the Moon into an orbit well outside of Earth’s Roche limit. By being partially stripped and subsequently torqued onto larger, stable orbits, spacecraft that initially pass inside the Roche limit can safely and predictably survive.

The Roche Limit is the separation between two celestial bodies at which one celestial body’s gravitational pull is sufficient to hold the other one in place.

The enigma surrounding the Moon’s composition has persisted even if earlier accepted hypotheses could account for some of its characteristics. A vast array of new options are made possible by the recent study.

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