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California (Reuters) - Two U.S. spacecraft were crashed into a lunar crater on Friday but scientists said it was too early to say whether the mission to search for supplies of water on the Moon had been a success.

NASA, which is hoping to find sufficient quantities of water to use as fuel for space exploration, said it could take two months to make a conclusive assessment of what was found.

Recent signs of water have upended ideas of the lunar surface as barren and unchanging, and evidence of ice would also suggest new possibilities for space travel.

"Water is essentially energy," scientist Victoria Friedensen said on NASA TV. "It can be used to make fuel."

WATER AS SPACE FUEL

Three studies released last month found clear evidence of water on the moon, but the skein of water bound with dust that was disclosed then was extremely thin.

"It's not enough to be of any economic importance," said NASA Lunar Science Institute Director David Morrison.