MAN FINALLY LITTERS ON THE MOON, CALLS IT SCIENCE
A discarded rocket stage is about to become humanity's first successful delivery of garbage to another celestial body.
A spent Falcon 9 upper stage, drifting derelict since a 2025 lunar mission, is on track to slam into the Moon this week at over 5,000 miles per hour, in what NASA is calling 'an unplanned kinetic geology experiment' and what everyone else is calling littering with excellent aim. The rocket, which has spent months tumbling through space with no job, no purpose, and presumably no health insurance, will finally achieve something: leaving a permanent dent on a body that predates human civilization by roughly four billion years.
Scientists are thrilled, insisting the impact crater will yield 'invaluable data' about lunar subsurface composition. Privately, several admit the invaluable data is secondary to the fact that a rocket is about to hit the Moon at highway-plus-4,900-miles-per-hour and everyone wants to watch. 'We prefer the term unplanned kinetic geology experiment,' said one NASA researcher, adjusting his glasses. 'Also, we mostly just wanted to watch it go boom.' Early simulations suggest the resulting dust plume may briefly resemble the SpaceX logo, a detail researchers are diplomatically referring to as 'branding data.'
Ron Rugundy delivered the news with the solemnity of a man narrating a moon landing rather than a moon littering. 'Mankind has taken its garbage problem to the Moon,' he intoned, mustache trembling with pride. 'A giant leap for litter.' He paused for the full seven seconds of gravitas he is contractually owed before adding: 'One small dent for man. One giant dent for mankind.' Cleanup crews, it should be noted, are not currently scheduled, because there are none, because we are in space, because nobody thought that far ahead.
