The Moon floats high in the sky, bright, beautiful, with dark spots on a shiny disk. On a full moon, it resembles someone's round, good-natured, slightly mocking face. We always see her like this. And before us, for thousands of years, people looked at the exact same Moon and dark spots were distributed on it in the same way, which make it look like a human face. For thousands of years, people have been observing the changes in her bright face - from the thin sickle of a newborn month to the full radiance of her disk. Meanwhile, the Moon is a ball, the same as other planets, including our Earth, on which we live. But the moon never shows us its other side, we don't see it. Why?

The moon rotates on its axis and at the same time makes its way around the earth, because it is a satellite of the earth.

In twenty-nine and a half days, it makes its revolution around the Earth, and ... it takes the same amount of time to turn around its axis - it makes this revolution so slowly. And that's the whole point. That is why we always see only one side of it.

But how does it happen anyway? To make this clearer to you, let's do a little experiment. Take some small table (if there is no table - a chair or something else that is more convenient for you, what will be at hand). This chair will be an imaginary Earth, and you yourself will be the Moon, which wraps around the Earth. Start moving around the table, staying facing it all the time. At the beginning of your movement, for example, you saw a window in front of you, but then, as you make your circle around the table (that is, the Earth), this window will be behind you, and only at the end of the path you will see it again . This will only confirm that you have turned not only around the table, but also around yourself, your axis.

So is the Moon. It makes a revolution around the Earth and at the same time around its own axis.

But everyone now knows that we still saw the far side of the moon! How did it happen? Do you remember? .. However, no, you don’t remember this: in those years you were still too small! And this happened in 1959, when Soviet scientists launched an automatic station towards the Moon, which flew around our satellite and transmitted images from its other side to us on Earth. And people all over the world saw the far side of the moon for the first time!

And that's not all. A few years later, Soviet scientists again sent an automatic station towards the Moon, and this time again photographs were taken and sent to Earth. Thanks to the images, scientists then compiled the first map of both sides of the lunar surface, and then a new color map of the Moon with lunar seas, mountain ranges, the most important peaks, ring crater mountains, circuses.

While I was writing these pages, one piece of news followed another. Before I had time to tell you about the new color map, an amazing event took place: in February 1966, the world's first automatic station, our Soviet one, landed on the Earth's satellite! She made, as scientists say, a soft landing - this means that she landed on the moon smoothly, without breaking the equipment.

Having gently landed on the moon, the automatic station immediately began to work hard - it sent more and more pictures of the lunar surface, and these pictures were taken at close range. But this is extremely important! The images were large, accurate: scientists simply pounced on these amazing documents, carefully examined them; now they saw what the surface of the moon is like, what is on it, asserted or, on the contrary, changed their points of view about the lunar surface.

"Luna-9" made a soft landing on our satellite - the Moon. And shortly after that, in March 1966, Luna 10 was launched.

She began to make flights around the Moon, that is, she became her artificial satellite, and the Luna-10 devices sent messages to Earth that scientific researchers needed in order to better know our celestial neighbor.

"Luna-10" made its endless flight around the Moon, so close, familiar, and in the early days, the whole world could hear the melody of the communist anthem "The Internationale" coming from it.

After "Luna-10" there were also "Luna-11", and "Luna-12", and "Luna-14", and "Luna-16" ... All the time our messengers soar into outer space, they pave the first paths to our heavenly neighbor. And always the most difficult and most important thing is what is done for the first time!

However, the news of recent years is amazing! American astronauts, on the Apollo 11 spacecraft, Neil Armstrong, Edwin Aldrin and Michael Collins in July 1969 were the first to fly to the moon, two of them, Neil Armstrong and Edwin Aldrin, set foot on its surface, the third, Michael Collins, was waiting them by making circles around the moon.

The names of these cosmonauts will go down in history just like the name of our glorious Gagarin, who was the first to travel into space and see our planet Earth from the outside.

And a very special place in the study of our celestial neighbor is occupied by the amazing apparatus "Lunokhod-1", delivered to the Moon in November 1970. He worked hard there, doing the work of exploring the lunar surface for a man. This amazing apparatus worked only on a lunar day, when it could charge its batteries from the energy of the sun. And on a moonlit night, he rested, as they affectionately said about him: he slept.

Really, it all looks like a fairy tale.

And it may well happen that during the time this book is being printed, new amazing events will occur and we will have to expand this chapter, although at the beginning we were going to tell only about one thing: why we do not see the far side of the moon.

The moon is also called the goddess of the night. This is our silent neighbor, there is no life on it. It orbits the Earth at a distance of 384,400 kilometers (238.618 miles). A full revolution of the Moon around the Earth takes 27 days and 12 hours. This fact is of particular importance, it means that we will never be able to see the other side of the moon. Scientists have calculated that the moon should rotate around its axis much faster. But under the influence of the Earth's gravity, the speed of its rotation decreases, due to which the Moon's own rotation correlates with its movement around the Earth. This is why we always see only one side of the Moon.

The duration of day and night on the Moon does not change. The lunar day lasts about 14 days, and the night lasts the same. During the day and night, the temperature on the Moon varies greatly. It reaches about 120 degrees during the day and freezing temperatures at night. That's why the American astronauts, who were the first to walk on the moon, had special suits - space suits - that protected them from the heat.Neil Armstrong was the first to walk on the moon. "This small step for man is a huge step for mankind," he said as he stepped onto the surface of the moon. This startling event took place on July 15, 1969. Millions of viewers could see him on television with their own eyes. Through the lines of satellite television, the image from the Moon reached the most remote regions of the Earth.

Why is there no life on the moon?

Now that man has carefully explored the surface of the moon, he has learned a lot of interesting things about it. But the fact that there is no life on the moon, man knew long before he reached the moon. There is no atmosphere on the moon. Astronomers have established this because there is no twilight, no sunset on the Moon. On Earth, night falls gradually because the air reflects the sun's rays even after sunset. On the moon, it’s completely different: it was just light, and at one moment darkness came. The absence of an atmosphere means that the Moon is not protected from any solar radiation. The sun radiates heat, light and radio waves. Life on Earth depends on this heat and light.

But the Sun also emits harmful radiation. Earth's atmosphere protects us from it. And there is no atmosphere on the Moon that could absorb this harmful radiation. And all the sun's rays, useful and harmful, safely reach the surface of the moon.

Because there is no atmosphere, the Moon's surface is either excessively hot or excessively cold. The moon rotates, and the side that is turned towards the sun becomes very hot. Temperatures can reach over 150 degrees Celsius. This is hot boiling water. A hot lunar day lasts for two weeks.It is followed by a night, which also lasts two weeks. At night the temperature drops to 125 degrees below zero. This is twice as cold as the temperature that is observed at the North Pole.Under such conditions, none of the forms of life known on Earth can exist.

The Moon is a natural satellite of the Earth, at a distance of about 384,000 km (239,000 miles) from it. The Moon is much lighter and smaller than the Earth. It takes 29 days for it to revolve around the Earth. The moon does not emit its own light, but only reflects the light of the sun. As the Moon travels around the Earth, it appears before us in various forms. These different forms we call the phases of the moon. They are obtained as a result of the fact that, revolving around the Sun, the Earth obscures the Moon in different ways. The moon reflects a different amount of light depending on this.

The same side of the Moon always faces the Earth. Until 1959, when the Luna 3 satellite photographed the moon from the far side, we did not know what the other hemisphere looked like.

The moon is made up of solid rocks. Thousands of craters are visible on its surface. There are vast flat plains covered with dust and high mountains. It is possible that the craters were formed from bubbles that burst in the lunar crust as a result of volcanic activity millions of years ago. In orbit around the Earth, the Moon is held by the force of gravity. The force of gravity on the Moon is 6 times less than on Earth. From time to time, the water of the earth's oceans rushes towards the moon. It causes hot flashes.

Now that people have already visited the Moon, they have a concrete idea of ​​the Earth's satellite and, accordingly, can plan the construction of stations on this planet. Of course, living conditions there are quite difficult. The surface of the moon is literally pitted with huge craters, there are also quite high mountains, large seas of hardened volcanic lava have been discovered. Volcanic eruptions once occurred on the Moon, but today they are already inactive. The seas and the inner surface of the craters are covered with a thick layer of dust. There is no air, no water, no animals, no plants. No sound can be heard on the moon, as sounds are propagated by air molecules. Therefore, people need a special suit to move on the moon. Human dwellings on the Moon must be absolutely hermetic, like bathyscaphes for underwater research. Everything that is necessary for life support, up to the air itself, must be delivered from the Earth.

WHY DO WE ONLY SEE ONE SIDE OF THE MOON?

The Moon floats high in the sky, bright, beautiful, with dark spots on a shiny disk. On a full moon, it resembles someone's round, good-natured, slightly mocking face. We always see her like this. And before us, for thousands of years, people looked at the exact same Moon and dark spots were distributed on it in the same way, which make it look like a human face. For thousands of years, people have been observing the changes in her bright face - from the thin sickle of a newborn month to the full radiance of her disk. Meanwhile, the Moon is a ball, the same as other planets, including our Earth, on which we live. But the moon never shows us its other side, we don't see it. Why?
The moon rotates on its axis and at the same time makes its way around the earth, because it is a satellite of the earth.

In twenty-nine and a half days, it makes its revolution around the Earth, and ... it takes the same amount of time to turn around its axis - it makes this revolution so slowly. And that's the whole point. That is why we always see only one side of it.
But how does it happen anyway? To make this clearer to you, let's do a little experiment. Take some small table (if there is no table - a chair or something else that is more convenient for you, what will be at hand), This chair will be an imaginary Earth, and you yourself will be the Moon that wraps around the Earth. Start moving around the table and at the same time, very slowly around your axis. You will see that you will be facing the table all the time. At the beginning of your movement, for example, you saw a window in front of you, but then, as you make your circle around the table (that is, the Earth), this window will be behind you and only at the end of the path you will see it again. This will only confirm that you have turned not only around the table, but also around yourself.
So is the Moon. It makes a revolution around the Earth and at the same time around its own axis.
But I must tell you that we did see the other side of the moon! How did it happen? Do you remember? .. However, no, you don't remember that; in those years you were still too small! And this happened in 1959, when Soviet scientists launched a rocket towards the Moon, which flew around our satellite, took pictures from its other side and transmitted these pictures to us, to Earth. And people all over the world saw the far side of the moon for the first time!
And that is not all. A few years later, Soviet scientists again sent a rocket towards the Moon, and this time again photographs were taken and sent to Earth. Thanks to these images, scientists have compiled the first map of both sides of the lunar surface. We now have a new color map of the Moon with lunar seas, with mountain ranges, the most important peaks, ring-shaped crater mountains, circuses.
In February 1966, the world's first rocket, ours, Soviet, landed on the Earth's satellite. She made, as scientists say, a soft landing, which means that she landed on the moon smoothly, without breaking the equipment, approximately the way a rocket should land on board, on board of which the first researchers will arrive on the moon. Our rocket, having gently landed on the moon, immediately began to work hard - it sent more and more pictures of the lunar surface, and these pictures were taken at close range. But this is extremely important! The images were obtained large, accurate; scientists simply pounced on these amazing documents, carefully examined them; now they saw what the surface of the moon is like, what is on it, asserted, or, on the contrary, changed their points of view about the lunar surface. "Luna-9" made a soft landing on our satellite - the Moon. And soon after this remarkable flight, in March 1966, the Luna-10 rocket was launched again, it began to fly around the Moon, that is, it became its artificial satellite, and the Luna-10 instruments sent messages to Earth that needed by research scientists to better know our heavenly neighbor.
"Luna-10" made its endless flight around the Moon, so close, familiar, and in the early days, the whole world could hear the melody of the Communist anthem "Internationale" coming from it.
Here is the news again! After Luna-10 there was also Luna-11, Luna-12, Luna-13, which again made a soft landing on our satellite.
All the time, Soviet rockets soar into unknown outer space, they pave the first paths to distant celestial bodies. And in October 1967, the whole world was shocked by the news that the Soviet interplanetary station "Venera-4" smoothly descended on the surface of Venus - one of the planets of our solar system. Who knows what news tomorrow will bring us.
In any case, while the book was published, we managed to add a lot to this chapter, which at first tried to tell only one thing: why we do not see the far side of the moon.

The constant companion of our planet not only makes you think about the eternal, but also throws food for thought. Why do we see only one side of the Moon if all celestial bodies rotate around their own axis? Maybe this is part of some conspiracy, and on the back of the satellite there is some kind of secret alien base or traces of colonization by an ancient civilization?

How did the moon appear?

The moon is a massive body that has fallen into the zone of action of the Earth's gravity. Exists several theories of its origin:

• It was captured by gravity several billion years ago.
• It was formed as a result of the union of several hundred meteorites that fell under the influence of gravity.
• It is a part of the earth's crust that broke away as a result of a collision with a meteorite.

The most popular theory today is that once there was a collision of the Earth and a small planet with an unstable orbit.

According to another version, the culprit of the cataclysm is a meteorite that passed "on a tangent" and directly beat off part of the earth's crust.

In the first case, the Moon must be part of this same planet. In the second - part of the surface of our planet, under the influence of centrifugal force formed into a sphere.

The whole problem lies in the fact that we are talking about events that took place billions of years ago. Now we cannot tell with certainty about the events of a thousand years ago, what can we say about such colossal terms.

Why doesn't the moon fall to earth?

The moon simultaneously revolves around the earth and around its own orbit. As a result, two forces interact:

Thanks to the interaction of two forces, our eternal companion"can't fly away from us. But it also cannot fall to the surface of the planet, for exactly the same reasons.

If one day this state of equilibrium is disturbed, a terrible cataclysm can occur. But we are talking about cosmic quantities, not a single person is able to influence them. In any case, at the current level of development of science.

Thanks to this pleasant coincidence, the Earth has a satellite. And thanks to another coincidence, in the form of an identical period of rotation around the planet and around its axis, we only see the "bright" side of the moon.

Why does the moon glow at night?

But why is the side facing us always “bright”? After all, the moon does not have its own luminary that would illuminate it according to some kind of schedule.

And to delve into the further description, it is better recall the course of school physics:

1. The sun's rays can reflect off surfaces.
2. After reflection, the angle of propagation of the rays changes.
3. Despite contact with the surface, the reflected light travels further.
4. The ability to reflect depends on the number of rays that continue their path.

At night, the Earth turns to the Sun on the other side, so it gets dark in our hemisphere. But nothing prevents the Moon from contacting the nearest star.

Direct sunlight hits its surface. Part of it remains there, their energy is spent on heating the lunar soil. No wonder its temperature can exceed a hundred degrees.

But a small part of the rays is reflected from the surface and directed in our direction. Thanks to this phenomenon, there is another source of light in the night sky.

Why don't they fly to the moon anymore?

The second half of the last century was marked by real hysteria, in which the two powers were drawn. It's about "lunar race" when Americans and Soviet citizens aspired to the same goal - to be the first to land on the moon.

The United States unconditionally won this competition, which is more offensive - not a single Soviet cosmonaut ever set foot on the surface of our satellite. This is despite the fact that humanity first saw the "dark side" precisely thanks to the apparatus made and launched in the Union.

But decades go by, and no one really aspires to the moon anymore.

This is motivated by a number of reasons:

• Lack of funding.
• The main experiments and studies have already been carried out.
• For the coming decades, there is enough surface data to be processed.
• Flights are extremely expensive.
• There is no one else to compete with and thus prove their superiority.

Some of the arguments sound pretty plausible. But, on the other hand, more than one, not even two expeditions were sent to the Moon. There were more. And then everything stopped. And no other country has tried to land to get another reason for pride.

Silent consent, it seems that all countries of the world were able to agree on one issue. Maybe somewhere there, at a distance of about 300 thousand kilometers, there really was a contact with something unknown and humanity was hinted opaquely what further research is fraught with?

These are just conspiracy theories, but after all, after a jerk to the side, all countries “turned on the back” and stopped developing their space programs so actively. Perhaps we are not really welcome there.

The invisible side of the moon

The lunar cycle is 28 days, almost everyone remembers this. The problem is that both periods of rotation fit in 28 days - around the Earth and its own axis. Such a coincidence, but because of it, we are forced to constantly observe only one half of the celestial body.

Due to the current situation, a person will never be able to see the “dark side” while on the surface of the Earth. Actually, it sounds like a challenge. And it will be nice to know that humanity passed this test with dignity.

Thanks to unmanned expeditions, we have photographs and detailed maps of that “invisible” half. From the point of view of “science for the sake of science”, the achievement is unprecedented, but if you think about the practical application of the data obtained.

True, there is one positive thing. We made sure that an alien space fleet was not lurking behind the Moon, that its surface was not dotted with someone's bases. Such is the consolation for paranoids and dreamers.

It is either too lazy to think about natural phenomena, or there is no time for this. And why we see only one side of the Moon, and because of what the seasons change - this was all once explained, but too long ago.

Video about the position and rotation of the moon

After watching this video, it will become clear to you why the Moon always faces the earth with the same side:

The eternal companion of the Earth, surrounded by romantic stories and scientific mysteries - the Moon - is shown as a fixed side 100% of the time. But why is the other side of the Moon not visible, are there mystical facts in the theory, or is it easy to explain the process from the point of view of physics and astronomy?

How is the turnover?

The Internet is full of photos and videos compiled from them throughout the year, which show exactly how we see the moon. The principles of celestial mechanics will help explain the phenomenon of one side of the cosmic body.

The planet rotates around its own axis and the Sun, and for the Moon, the "sun" becomes the Earth. It revolves around the personal axis and the planet. The speed of a celestial body going around the Earth is 100% the same as the speed of rotation around its own axis.

This means that the Moon rotates 100% synchronously around the planet and around the axis. This was not always the case, and the process of rotation at first looked different. Under the influence of the Earth's gravity and the tides, the planet slowly adjusted the satellite to its own characteristics. This is the reason why the far side of the Moon is not visible.

Practical rotation example

To understand exactly how the turnover occurs, you can conduct a small experiment:

1. Place a chair in the center of the room. This is Earth.
2. Stand at arm's length and place your fingertips in the center of the object. You are the Moon.
3. Start moving so that your fingers do not move. Make a full circle.

Did you notice that you were on one side of the object during the experiment? This also happens with the Earth's satellite.

Do we see exactly half from Earth?

A complete revolution of a celestial body takes only 27 days 7 hours and 43.1 minutes of time. If you look at the video, where the process is recorded for a whole year, it becomes clear that we see more than 50% of the Moon. On the opposite side, 41% of the surface remains inaccessible.

The rotation of the satellite does not always occur at the same speed. Lunar librations occur - when the satellite approaches the Earth at a minimum distance, the speed increases. As the lunar orbit gets farther, the speed slows down. It is also important to understand that celestial bodies rotate along an ellipsoidal trajectory.

More than 4 billion years ago, the Earth and its satellite formed, they rotated faster, and their speeds differed. Now the big planet has adjusted the small one for itself, and this is the main reason why the far side of the moon is not visible to the eye.