The Moon

Earth’s Moon What’s the Moon like?

41)The Moon’s revolution around the earth is the same as its rotation on its axis. 42)On Earth, we always see the same side of the Moon.

TRUE/FALSE The Sun’s rays never strike the back side of the moon? False – Sun’s rays hits all sides of the moon because it is rotating and orbiting.

Creation of the moon? 40)One theory of how the moon formed is an extremely large celestial body collided with the Earth and the collision caused a large portion of the Earth’s mantle to break away and orbit the Earth.

How Big is the Moon?

43)The moon is approximately 25 % or one-fourth the size of Earth. 44)The Moon is about 400 times smaller than the Sun, but it also happens to be about 400 times closer. The result is that from Earth, the moon and the sun appear to be the same size.

Earth and Moon to Scale If Earth were a basketball, then the Moon would be a tennis ball.

 45)The Moon's light comes from the Sun, and the sunlight is reflected off the Moon's surface. 46)The Moon rises and sets almost 1 hour later each night.

47)The moon can be seen during the day 47)The moon can be seen during the day. The time and length of day the moon can be seen varies with the phase of the moon.  48)The same side of the Moon always faces the Earth because the Moon turns on its axis at the same rate as it revolves around the Earth.

49)The Sun's rays do strike the back side of the Moon 49)The Sun's rays do strike the back side of the Moon. However, from our position on Earth, we never see the light striking the back side of the Moon.

Moon Stats Moon’s orbit around Earth is inclined about 5 degrees to Earth’s plane of orbit around the Sun Ecliptic plane Moon’s orbital plane Moon Earth Sun Moon’s orbit around the Earth is elliptical: ~0.15% out of circular. Tilted by 5º from the Ecliptic. Mean Distance: 384,400 km Perigee (Closest Approach): 363,300 km Apogee (Maximum Distance): 405,500 km Appears ~11% larger at Perigee than at Apogee Understanding this is fundamental to understanding why eclipses do not happen every month, or getting the reason for phases confused with eclipses. Image created by LPI staff 13