A common mistake that people make when trying to design something completely foolproof is to underestimate the ingenuity of complete fools.
Douglas Adams


I think NASA has finally figured out a way to operate that may allow them to have a few more successful missions. When they sent the Mars Rovers they dropped out of orbit and were slowed by parachutes and then bounced enclosed in a group of air bags.
The Mars Rover mission has been one of the few successful missions NASA has had in the last few years. They have had major errors that caused the Hubble Telescope to be useless until another very expensive mission was sent to fix it. They have had Landers that were destroyed because of stupid mistakes in math, and have had a lot of satellites just not work after launch. This is without even taking into account the deaths that have resulted from allowing contractors to get away with poor design and shoddy workmanship.
Don’t get me wrong there have also been some amazing successes and I think the space program is very important. I think the last thing that should continue is a space program run by an agency more interested in looking good than performing their mission.

As I said the NASA brain trust has figured out that it will be easier to have successful missions if a crash is what is planed in the first place.
The next moon mission is like that. First a craft will be deployed to orbit the moon, and then another will be launched at the surface to impact and send up a plume of material that will be passed through by the rocket section of the craft which will analyze the plume looking for water. Then the rocket will act as a second impactor and the satellite section will analyze the plume from that.
They want to find water to help in future manned missions to the moon.
This way they get to say the Lander crashed into the moon and it will be a good thing even if it misses its intended target by half the Moon.

I think they should stop giving contractors such outrageous amounts of money and just send a little probe with a dowsing stick attached to the front of it. That’s always been the surest way to find water anyway.