This is a picture of the lunar farside taken on 12/24/1968. The picture was taken from the Apollo 8 spacecraft.
Click on image for full size
Courtesy of NASA
What are the flat surfaces on the Moon called? What is maria? What are lunar highlands?
What phase was the Moon in on December, 22 1962?
How long does it take the Moon to travel from one phase to the next?
Suppose that the Moon spun twice on its axis during each orbit around the Earth. How would study of the Moon from the Earth be easier?
If the Moon is tilted only slightly with respect to the Sun, do the lunar poles receive nearly constant sunlight?
Wow! More Moon questions! Okay, here goes...
There 2 types of surfaces on the Moon. Dark regions on the Moon are called maria. They are flat and don't have many craters. The light highlands are hilly and are covered with craters.
The U.S. Navy has created a web page where you can find the moon phase for any day. Check it out! It takes the Moon almost 4 days to get from one phase to the next.
We can only see half of the Moon from Earth. The Moon is locked into a specific orbit around the Earth so that we only see one side. If the Moon spun twice during each orbit around the Earth, it wouldn't be locked into that orbit and we could see the far side of the Moon from Earth. As it is now, we can only see the far side of the Moon when a spacecraft takes a look for us.
And yup, since the Moon is tilted only a tiny bit, the poles do receive NEARLY constant sunlight.
Submitted by Nicholas (age 30, Rhode Island, U.S.A.), Megan (middleschool), Vilma (age 13, Texas, U.S.A.), Craig (age 13, North Carolina, U.S.A.), Margaret (age 15, Oklahoma, U.S.A.), Vicky (age 15, New York, U.S.A.), Joni (age 37, West Virginia, U.S.A.)
(January 12, 2001)
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