Earth’s Oldest Rock Found — It was Hiding on the Moon!
Big Bertha is the oldest Earth rock ever discovered, and it was found on the Moon, among the samples returned from the Apollo 14 mission. Researchers estimate the crystal-rich rock is around four billion years old.
Apollo 14 launched January 31, 1971, on a nine-day journey to bring astronauts Alan Shepard and Edgar Mitchell to the lunar surface. Stuart Roosa orbited above the Moon, piloting the command module, Kitty Hawk. After touching down in the Fra Mauro formation (the planned destination for the unsuccessful Apollo 13 mission), astronauts collected material from the Moon, including Big Bertha.
“It is an extraordinary find that helps paint a better picture of early Earth and the bombardment that modified our planet during the dawn of life,” said David Kring of the Lunar and Planetary Institute.
Big Bertha likely crystallized 20 kilometers (12.5 miles) under the crust of the Earth, before being jettisoned out into space four billion years ago. At that time, the Moon was only one-third as far from our planet as it is today. The rock collided with our planetary companion, and the region in which it landed was then impacted by a second collision event 3.9 billion years ago, burying the rock, and melding it with native materials found there. Finally, 26 million years before our time, another body…
