- 1704 - There are 2 sides to a Full Moon? Why are they so different. Here are the current theories.
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--------------------------- 1704 - There are 2 sides to a Full Moon?
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- Our Moon is tidally locked with mother Earth. The same side of the Moon always faces us. We call it a Full Moon , but, we only see a “Half Moon“. The Moon rotates one revolution ( one moon day) with the same period as it revolves once around the Earth.
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- It was 1959 before we got the first blurry images of the far-side of the Moon. The far side is much different than the “ Full Moon” side that we see. The crust on the far side is much thicker and more densely cratered. The flat plains of “lunar maria” we see is missing on the far side.
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- On the near-side “maria” cover 30% of the surface. These “seas” on the Moon look darker because they are made of iron basalts. The lighter parts of the moon’s landscape are mineral feldspar magma.
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- The largest “mare” on the near-side is 1,600 miles across. It is rich in potassium and phosphorus minerals.
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- The far-side is absent of mare and is covered almost entirely by craters.
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- Why are the two side of the Moon so different?
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- The far-side crust is twice as thick as the near-side crust ( 37 miles versus 12 to 19 miles).
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- The Moon was formed in the early evolution of the Earth when a Mars-size protoplanet impacted Earth and splashed a cloud of molten debris, crust, into orbit. The material first settled into a ring in orbit around the Earth, then, over time coalesced into our satellite.
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- As the surface of the Moon cooled heavy elements sank toward the center and the lighter elements floated to the surface. Cooling further the mantle crystallized.
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- Large impacts from asteroids and meteors struck the Moon creating the great basins. Many smaller ones created the craters.
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- So far there is not an explanation for the difference between the two sides. The next hypothesis is that the Mars-size protoplanet splashed material in to orbit that created two moons, not a single moon. After tens of millions of years the smaller moon impacted the larger moon and the two merged.
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- The calculations to support this theory have the smaller moon impacting at 6,000 miles per hour, having a total mass of 1/30th the mass of the larger Moon.
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- The shockwave traveling through the Moon would explain how radioactive elements are found on the near-side and not the far-side. This would also explain why the near-side has a thinner crust. With a thinner crust this would explain the different effect of the meteor and asteroid impacts. Larger craters would naturally be gouged out of the crust. The seas (mare) would be created by the heated mantle uplifting to the surface.
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- To be definitive on this hypothesis for the Moon’s evolution we need more data and more computer models. The picture seems plausible, but, stay tuned there is still more to learn.
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- When I tell someone the Moon is 1/4th the size of the Earth they don’t believe me. Actually it is more than that it is 27% the size of the Earth.
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-------------------- Diameters: 2,160 miles / 7,926 miles = 27%
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- However, size is not the same as mass. The Moon is made of the lighter Earth-crust. All the heavy metals have sunk to the center of the Earth. The Moon is light density. The Earth has a heavy, dense core. The Moon is only 1.2% the mass of the Earth.
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------------- Masses: 7.348 * 10^22 kilograms / 598.42 * 10^22 kilograms = 1.2%
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- To get off the Earth the rocket needs to be going 25,000 miles per hour. To get of the Moon the rocket only needs to be going 5,400 miles per hour.
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- The escape velocity is the speed the rocket needs to reach to escape the force of gravity, or, to climb out of the well of warped space-time, depending on how you see gravity working.
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- The square of the velocity is directly proportional to the larger mass, “M”, and indirectly proportional to the distance from its center, the radius ,”R“..
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-------------------- V^2 = 2*G*M / R
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- “G” is the Gravitational Constant which is the acceleration of gravity the same everywhere in the Universe ( we think ). It is a very small number, gravity is a weak force.
----------------- G = 6.67*10^-11 meters^3 / kilogram*seconds^2
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---------------- V^2 = 2* (6.67*10^-11) * ( 7.348*10^22) / 1.7*10^ meters
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---------------- V^2 = 5.76*10^6
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---------------- V = 2,400 meters / second = 5,400 miles per hour.
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