Molecular dynamic simulation was applied in analyzing the difference of surface damage during the impact of a large silica cluster on a crystal silicon substrate in dry and wet condition, respectively. The simulation results show that the damage of silicon substrate under the dry impact is more severe than that under the wet impact. A reason is that the water film buffers the impact of the incident cluster at the init stage under the wet impact. The more important reason is that the water film might be solidified into a continuous thin film at the cluster deformation stage. So, the considerable great impact energy of the cluster will be absorbed by the water film and transformed into thermal dissipation of energy between the simulation ensemble and the water film. (C) 2011 Elsevier B. V. All rights reserved.