Who is South Pole-Aitken Basin?

The South Pole-Aitken Basin is one of the biggest and oldest holes on the Moon.

Imagine you're playing with clay, and you press your thumb really hard into it, that’s like what happened to the Moon a long time ago. A big space rock hit the Moon, making a huge dent. That dent is the South Pole-Aitken Basin.

This hole is so big that if you were standing on the edge of it and looked across, it would take you a very long walk to reach the other side, like walking from one end of your neighborhood to the other, but even longer!

It's also super old. It was made billions of years ago, when the Moon was still young and getting hit by space rocks every day.

This basin is special because it’s deep and has a lot of interesting things inside, like different kinds of rock that tell us about how the Moon formed. Scientists study it to learn more about our Moon's history, just like you might look at your favorite toy to figure out how it works.

It's kind of like a time capsule from the Moon’s past!