@liljo saidI just watched the Today Show on NBC this morning. The title to their news clip was called "China and US in new space race". My government wants to put a satellite in orbit around the moon to see what China is doing on the other side of the tidally locked moon.
Yes, very likely.
https://news.yahoo.com/nasa-mission-spots-chinese-rocket-130006425.html
It is obvious to me that my government suspects the same thing I did, that it was China. I am guessing it was an empty fuel tank that crashed on the moon. They are disposable when empty. It is possible it was a failed mission, but I would bet it was just disposable junk in a weak orbit.
Now my government is wondering how many missions to the moon China has been doing secretly. They even accused China of trying to take over the moon. LOL!
@metal-brain saidWhy do you even care?
A spacecraft to orbit the moon is on the way. All to know what China might be doing on the far side of the moon we cannot see from earth.
What exactly is your worst-case scenario?
@sonhouse saidI doubt those craters would be in the Ocean of Storms. It would get some sunlight if it was, unless it is in some kind of cave. This is why the only realistic craters that could hold permanent ice would be at the poles.
@Metal-Brain
Nobody has actually visited the sites with water ice. They are deep inside craters that never get sunlight so the temperatures remain permanently hundreds of degrees below zero. And NASA has done surveys of the region by radar and has shown the possibility of massive amounts of water ice in those craters but as to the piece found it is not worth pursuing China or not. There are many more interesting things to discover on the moon.
@medullah saidThis has been explained in Thread 193919
Does anyone know why the moon doesn’t rotate on its axis? My understanding is that the dark side of the moon is always the dark side of the moon? Am I wrong ?
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@medullah saidIt's tidally locked to the Earth. (In other words, it does rotate on its axis, but because of the harmonics of the gravitational pull between it and the Earth, it does so in the same period it revolves around us, so we always see the same side.)
Does anyone know why the moon doesn’t rotate on its axis? My understanding is that the dark side of the moon is always the dark side of the moon? Am I wrong ?
By the way, the dark side of the moon is not always the same. Because it's tidally locked to us, it shares our dark side, so where it's day on Earth, the corresponding part of the moon is also light. What's always (ish) the same is the far side of the moon. Not the same thing.
I could try and explain this all day long, but really, trying to do that with only text is futile. You'll understand it much better if you either find yourself an orrery (expensive!), or visit a planetarium. Which reminds me, I must one of these days visit Eise Eisinga.
@medullah
Because Earth tides have made the rotation of the moon equal to it's 'year' it mostly faces to us. one side only but we can guarantee it is rotating, it takes 28 odd days to do it. If you had a telescope point out from the lunar equator you would see the stars slowly change positions and 28 days later you would see the same stellar scene you saw the last time it was in that position.
-Removed-Incorrect. The degree of difference is inconsequential.
During any new moon, we see none of the sunlit portion. Therefore the entire sunlit portion is on the other side. Since the sunlit portion is, by necessity, half of the moon's surface, this means the degree of difference caused by the angle of the sun's rays isn't enough to cause any of the far side to darken, nor any of the near side to be lit.