It is all by chance, and there will be some chaos. NASA has chosen SpaceX, the rocket company founded by Elon Musk, to send astronauts back to the moon in the future. However, in the meantime, a 4-ton upper stage of a SpaceX rocket launched seven years ago is expected to crash into the moon on March 4. Amateur astronomers have made recent observations and calculations predicting the impact to occur at 7:25 am Eastern time. While there is still some uncertainty about the exact time and location of the impact, Bill Gray, creator of Project Pluto, a set of astronomical software, believes the rocket piece will not miss the moon. Gray stated that it is highly likely that the predicted impact will occur within a few minutes and a few kilometers of the expected time and location. Throughout the Space Age, various man-made objects have ventured into the solar system, with some not anticipated to return. One example is Musk's Tesla Roadster, launched into orbit passing Mars during SpaceX's Falcon Heavy rocket's inaugural flight in 2018. However, occasionally these objects circle back, as was the case in 2020 when a recently discovered unidentified object was identified as part of a rocket launched in 1966 during NASA's Surveyor missions to the moon. Gray has been monitoring this specific piece of SpaceX debris, which played a role in launching the Deep Space Climate Observatory for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration on February 11, 2015. The observatory, also known as DSCOVR, was originally intended for Earth observation under the name Triana, championed by Al Gore. However, it was repurposed for detecting solar storms and now regularly captures images of Earth from space. The upper stage of a Falcon 9 rocket is typically pushed back into Earth's atmosphere to prevent space clutter. The upper stage of the rocket used all of its propellant to send DSCOVR to its far-off destination, leaving it in a highly elevated orbit around Earth that intersects with the moon's orbit. This situation raises concerns about a potential collision in the future. The motion of the Falcon 9 stage, which is now uncontrolled, is influenced by the gravitational forces of Earth, the moon, and the sun, as well as pressure from sunlight. While debris in low-Earth orbit is closely monitored due to the threat it poses to satellites and the International Space Station, objects like the DSCOVR rocket in more distant orbits are often overlooked. Gray claims to be the only person tracking these objects. While many spacecraft have previously crashed on the moon, this seems to be the first instance of an object from Earth unintentionally ending up there. On January 5, a rocket stage came within 6,000 miles of the moon, and its trajectory appeared to potentially intersect with the moon later on. Gray asked amateur astronomers to monitor the object as it passed by Earth in January, and one of those who responded was Peter Birtwhistle, a retired IT professional living near London. Birtwhistle used his 16-inch telescope at the Great Shefford Observatory to track a rocket stage in the sky, noting its fast movement. The observations enabled scientists to predict where the rocket stage would impact, giving astronomers a final opportunity to observe before it goes beyond the moon's orbit and hits the far side, out of view from Earth. NASA's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter will not witness the impact live, but it will later fly over the expected impact location to capture images of the newly formed crater. Mark Robinson, a professor at Arizona State University and the principal investigator for the Orbiter's camera, estimates that the impact of 4 tons of metal traveling at 5,700 mph will create a crater measuring 10 to 20 meters wide. This event will allow scientists to study the lunar surface beneath and have precise details about the impact, unlike meteor strikes. India's Chandrayaan-2 spacecraft, also orbiting the moon, may also be able to photograph the impact site. Other spacecraft that are on their way to the moon this year may have the opportunity to see the impact site, unless they too accidentally create new craters.