What is this strange shape photographed near the Moon?

NASA's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) has recently captured images of an object looking strikingly like a surfboard, passing close to the Moon.


This object is none other than Danuri, the South Korean lunar orbiter. The images taken between March 5 and 6 by the LRO reveal Danuri speeding at a relative velocity of about 7,200 mph (11,500 km/h) compared to the LRO. This significant speed difference created a visual effect where Danuri appears stretched, taking on an elongated shape similar to a surfboard.

In reality, Danuri looks nothing like this shape. It is a cubic-shaped spacecraft, equipped with two solar panels on each side. The LRO, fitted with a very short exposure camera of only 0.338 milliseconds, struggled to capture this fast-moving event. However, the images obtained are clear enough to distinguish Danuri's true shape.


Paul Byrne, an associate professor of planetary science at Washington University in St. Louis, shared some of these images on X (formerly Twitter), clarifying that the elongated image is merely a visual effect due to the high relative speed of the two orbiters.