Views of the Moons South Pole. Most of the Moons polar regions are not visible from Earth, so knowledge of the lunar south pole comes from spacecraft. The Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) has been collecting data on the poles since 2009, and much of what we understand about the polar environment is derived from illumination (images) and topography (surface features) as shown in Fig. 1 and Fig 2. respectively.