Sky and Telescope - Divining Lunar Water: "November 19, 2003 | For centuries astronomers have known that the airless, Sun-baked Moon is dry. But the discovery of craters with permanently shadowed floors near the lunar poles raised an exciting possibility: Perhaps these dark hideaways contain water ice that could be mined by future astronauts?
In the 1990s the Clementine and Lunar Prospector spacecraft implied that such ice existed. The results were met with much fanfare in the media — it appeared that there was indeed ice on the Moon. But now scientists probing deep into the polar surface with radar have concluded that lunar ice, if present, will be more difficult "
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