Facts About the Moon

Moon is the only satellite of Earth, the third rock from the Sun. Here we will delve into some interesting facts about the Moon. It has been a silent witness to every thing that happened on the earth since ages. Earth and Moon have been dancing a 'Gravitational Tango' for more than 4.5 billion years now. Nowadays, there is renewed interest in exploration of the Moon, as the mineral deposits there have caught the attention of the world. One of the interesting facts about the Moon is that it has large deposits of Titanium on its surface which has attracted considerable attention in recent decades. Also, there are plans of building a permanent station on the Moon. Eventually, colonization of the Moon and other planets like Mars is imminent and inevitable as man would want to leave the cocoon of the Earth and spread beyond its confines.

Interesting Facts About the Moon

• Out of the 173 natural satellites in our solar system, the Moon, estimated to be 4.5 billion years old, is the fifth largest in size.
• The distance between Earth and the Moon is 384,403 km which is about 30 times the Earth's diameter. Light takes about 1.28 seconds to cross this distance.
• The diameter of the Moon is 3,474 km, which is about quarter of the Earth's radius.
• The Moon's surface area is less than one tenth of the total surface area of the Earth
• The plane of moon's orbit is tilted at an angle of 5.145^o to the plane of Sun's equator called the Ecliptic.
• The acceleration, due to gravity on the Moon is 1/6th of the acceleration, due to gravity on earth's surface. Your mass of course will remain the same but your weight which is a measure of the pull of gravity will change on the Moon. So, if you weigh 72 kg on the Earth, then your weight will be only 12 kg on the moon.
• The moon's rate of rotation around its own axis is the same as its rotation around the Earth. This is called synchronous rotation. The result of this kind of motion is that Moon's one side constantly faces the Earth, while the other side is always hidden away.
• 20th July 1969, marked a big leap in the history of mankind, as Neil Armstrong and Edwin Aldrin became the first men to land on the Moon, through the Apollo 11 space mission.
• The Moon's surface is pockmarked by millions of craters which were created by the impact of massive asteroids. The biggest impact crater on the Moon is 2,240 km in diameter and is 13km deep.
• The Moon has almost no atmosphere due to low surface gravity.
• One of the interesting facts about the Moon is that a day on the moon lasts for a month and the night that follows also lasts for a month! During the day, temperature reaches 107^oC and during the night it drops down to around -153^oC.
• Sea tides on Earth are caused by the Moon's gravitational pull on the Earth's oceans.
• Normally, there are 12 'Full Moons' in a year. However, due to an accumulation of some extra 11 days every year, an extra 13th Full Moon occurs after 2 or three years. It is called a 'Blue Moon' giving rise to the popular phrase, wherein a rare event is called 'Once in a Blue Moon'!
• Solar eclipses occur when Moon is in its 'New Moon phase' while Lunar eclipses occur on a 'Full Moon'. A lunar eclipse is caused by the engulfment of the Moon in the shadow of the Earth when the Earth-Moon and Sun are exactly aligned.
• Total Solar eclipses are very rare events indeed and they occur when the Moon comes exactly between the Sun and the Earth, and casts its shadow on the later.
• The prediction of every future solar eclipse and lunar eclipse is done using a known cyclic pattern of repetition called the Saros cycle.

Hope you have enjoyed reading these interesting facts about the Moon, as much as I enjoyed compiling them for you!