Here are images taken by the AMIE camera on board SMART-1 during the last few orbits prior to the Moon impact. They were taken between 15:19-17:34 CEST (17:19-19:34 UT) and were analyzed by camera scientists during the night of September 2-3.  They're amazingly clear and show excellent detail of the moon's surface.

   
   

These pics and other data gathered from SMART-1 will be analyzed by the science teams in the coming days. The ESA Portal plans to publish results as soon as they are available.

Additionally here are a series of impact images captured by the Canada-France-Hawaii Telescope (CFHT). The CFHT is a  3.6-meter optical/infrared telescope located atop the summit of Mauna Kea. While still to be confirmed, a preliminary assessment indicates the impact flash could have been caused by thermal emission from the impact itself or by the release of spacecraft volatiles.

There's no CNN in space to cover an event like this, SMART-1 only sent still pictures, and the telescopes on Earth are too far away. It's too bad we couldn't really see SMART-1 hit the moon. But that's why there are computer simulations, in this case, these two from ESA. So if you're through checking out SMART-1's final image transmissions in our other report on this lunar mission, then check below for simulations of how SMART-1's final flight may have looked like - from its own eyes.

Keifer Sutherland's 24 may have walked off with the Emmy for Best Drama series but even that would be eclipsed this Sunday when SMART-1, Europe's first probe to the Moon, deliberately slams itself on the surface of the moon.

Scheduled for 0542 GMT (1542 AEST) on September 3, the European Space Agency (ESA) chose this kamikaze ending over the other alternative: let the spacecraft crash anywhere on Earth or at any time due to orbital decay and lack of fuel.

Mission scientist Bernard Foing said "It's possible that much of the probe's structure will be preserved from the impact, accidentally creating a sculpture or a monument for future generations which says 'there you are, that was Europe's first attempt to explore the Moon'."

But SMART-1 will be remembered for other things as well. It has been hailed as the the vanguard of future space missions. It is powered by the revolutionary ion thruster, an engine only been used by US craft Deep Space 1 for its rendezvous with an asteroid and a comet.

Other SMART-1 innovations include seven miniaturized instruments weighing only 41 lbs (19 kilos): a new communications system, new-generation solar panels and a package of sensors and scanners. SMART-1 also explored locations at the moon's poles that where there could be water.

Launched into orbit in September 2003, SMART-1's final resting place will be the lunar plain known as Lake of Excellence.

Thanks to AMIE, or the Advanced Moon Imaging Experiment, via ESA's SMART-1 spacecraft, we now have an up close and personal (well okayyy, not personal) high-resolution view of the young crater "Cuvier C" on the moon.

Crater Cuvier was named after Georges Cuvier, a 19th century French naturalist who was responsible for the creation of the field of comparative anatomy. Why did they name it after him? We don't know either. All we know is that Cuvier C is located at the edge of the old crater Cuvier which is 77 kilometres in diameter.

AMIE obtained this image a few months ago, (March 18, 2006 to be exact) from a distance of 591 kilometres from the surface, with a resolution of 53 metres per pixel. If you have no idea what the hell you're supposed to be looking for in that image, it's that crater on the lower right part of the image that runs about ten kilometres across. Yep, you got it, that's Cuvier C.

An ion engine operates by removing electrons from atoms of a gas – usually xenon – and then accelerating the resulting ions through an electric field. Thrust is created as the ions are shot out the back of the engine and it could have enough kick to send a spacecraft all the way to Titan, Saturn's giant moon, more than 1 billion kilometres from the Sun. Ion engines are also more fuel efficient than conventional rockets while providing a steady source of propulsion that makes it ideal for spacecrafts designed to fly to the outer solar system.

In 1998, NASA tried out ion engines on its Deep Space 1 mission, which headed for an asteroid and a comet 203 million km from the Sun. But the NSTAR engines used during the mission were not powerful enough for more distant journeys. NASA's new Evolutionary Xenon Thruster (NEXT) can generate 236 milliNewtons (6.9 kilowatts) of engine power. That is 2.5 times as much thrust as the NSTAR engine and enough for longer space trips. NEXT is also more powerful than the 22 mN engines on Japan's Hayabusa spacecraft sent to asteroid Itokawa and the 70 mN engines on the European Space Agency's SMART-1 lunar probe.

Like NSTAR, NEXT uses xenon gas as its propellant and solar arrays to capture energy from sunlight but it provides more thrust than previous ion engines. It can also throttle down to lower levels as it travels farther from the Sun and receives less sunlight. This power efficiency allows it to operate at greater distances than NSTAR.

The first NEXT engine has passed NASA's preliminary tests and now faces new tests that will determine how well it holds up to extremes of temperature it may experience in space. NASA hopes to have engine testing completed by September 2007, so that NEXT could be considered for future missions to send an orbiter and a lander to Titan or possibly Jupiter.

Although the main objective of the ESA SMART-1 spacecraft is to test out new electric propulsion for future space missions, it has also been busy taking pictures of the lunar surface. Over the past 30 months, those images have given scientists new insights into lunar geology.

From Earth, lunar highlands appear as light regions, while the lunar plains or “maria” show up as dark patches. The left image show the highlands, taken by the Advanced Moon Imaging Experiment instrument as SMART-1 passes only 1112 kilometres (approximately 900 miles) above the lunar surface. The image on the right is that of a lunar "sea," or mare, taken  from 1990 kilometres (about 1500 miles) away. The images were taken last January, but not released until 26 May.

Lunar "seas" (maria) formed after large impacts from meteors carved out basins in the lunar crust. When the Moon was volcanic, magma flowed out of cracks in the surface, filling the basins and eventually hardening, resulting in smooth flat areas. Since the maria have fewer impact craters than the highland areas, it is apparent that the formation of the maria happened relatively recently.