An astronomer has caught on video the moment that an asteroid, weighing an estimated 400kg, smashed into the Moon at 38,000 miles per hour (61,150 km/h).
Professor Jose Maria Madiedo of the University of Huelva, Spain, saw the images whilst operating two telescopes at 20:07 GMT on 11th September 2013, but has now published his report by the Royal Astronomical Society (RAS).
The impact shows up as a bright flash of light followed by an afterglow that lasts around eight seconds, making it the largest lunar impact ever recorded, and equivalent to around 15 tonnes of TNT.
The high velocity impact would have turned the asteroid molten, before vaporising, and causing the observable flash of light, which may have been visible to the naked eye on earth.
Scientosts also created a longer video that includes an explanation of the impact and the MIDAS observatory:
