I saw the video frames on Drudge of the explosion. How do you get an explosion that flashes light with no oxygen? Was this a meteor full of gas and oxygen?
Are you implying it was Ted Kennedy that crashed into the moon? Except one of the elements would be Chivas.
Flying dust illuminated by sunlight would be visible.
Moon dust is rather pale, and when dust particles are illuminated by the Sun against the blackness of space...
Oxygen is not needed for an explsion. Explosives don't require atmospheric oxygen, either. In this case, the energy of the impact is high enough to heat the materials involved so you get a flash of light.
The kinetic energy of the incoming meteoroid has to go someplace. Some of it's going to go into the ejecta, much of it's going to go into a sound wave that propagates through the moon, but some of it's going to go into heat. The heat is enough briefly to ionize some of the material. As the ionized atoms recombine with electrons, they give off light.
The hot matter that is left over will also, for a time, give off light through incandescence, just like a light bulb filament. Hot things just radiate light.
The energy of the the collision is enough to heat the material to incandescence. It's not a fire, any more than the filament in an electric light bulb is "burning". It gives off light because it's HOT.
a....ughhh.... Ted Kennedy.