The Moon

ronald1 · Post by **ronald1** » Sat Mar 17, 2007 5:08 pm

The Dark side of the moon is never illuminated by the sun. So how did Astronomers find out what it looked like?

deleted-2131 · Post by **deleted-2131** » Sat Mar 17, 2007 9:21 pm

The short answer to your question is this: Astronomers know what the dark side of the Moon looks like because we have put satellites and people into orbit around the Moon. This means that these satellites and people see not only the light side of the Moon, but also its dark side. These peolpe can satellites can then take pictures of the dark side of the Moon and send them back to Earth for astronomers to study.

deleted-71588 · Post by **deleted-71588** » Sun Mar 18, 2007 1:16 pm

Another critical point is the "far" side or hemisphere of the moon pointing away from the earth is not "dark". At the phase in the approximately 28 day Earth / Moon / Sun relationship when when only a small cresent of the "near" side is lighted, the "far" side is well lighted!

There is no such thing as a permanent "dark" side of lunar surface. For much of the lunar surface, the lunar day is approximately 14 earth days long.