Europe's first spacecraft to the moon ended its three-year mission Sunday by crashing into the lunar surface in a volcanic plane called the Lake of Excellence, to a round of applause in the mission control room. Hitting at 2 kilometers (1¼ miles) per second, or 7,200 kilometers per hour (4,475 mph), the impact of the SMART-1 spacecraft was expected to leave a 3-meter-by-10-meter crater and send dust kilometers above the surface. Observatories watched the event from Earth and scientists hoped the cloud of dust and debris would provide clues to the geologic composition of the site. «That's it _ we are in the Lake of Excellence,» said spacecraft operations chief Octavio Camino as applause broke out in mission control in Darmstadt, Germany. «We have landed.» Minutes later, officials showed off a picture captured by an observatory in Hawaii displaying a bright flash from the impact, the Associated Press reported.
