The first impression anyone will have of a Lunar Settlement will be that of a complex of mounds, the two-four meter ( six-thirteen foot ) overburden of Lunar soil used as thermal insulation and cosmic ray shielding. The downward pressure of this much lunar soil per square inch is much less than the upward pressure of the air inside the habitat. So this blanket of soil does not present a stress upon the habitat(s). You can look at this blanket of dust as an analog of the blanket of air which protects us on Earth from the same hazards. In fact, if you could freeze out Earth’s atmosphere, it would provide a light snowy blanket about 15 feet thick.