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The constant satellite of our planet not only makes us think about the eternal, but also gives us food for thought. Why do we see only one side of the Moon if all celestial bodies rotate around their axis? Maybe this is part of some kind of conspiracy, and on the other side 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 caught in the Earth's gravity zone. Exists several theories of its origin:

• Was captured by gravity several billion years ago.
• It was formed as a result of the combination of several hundred meteorites that fell under the influence of gravity.
• Represents part earth's crust, broken off as a result of a collision with a meteorite.

Today, a very popular theory is that Once there was a collision between the Earth and a small planet with an unstable orbit.

According to another version, the culprit of the cataclysm is a meteorite that passed “tangentially” and directly knocked off part of the earth’s crust.

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

The whole problem is that we are talking about events that took place billions of years ago. Now we cannot talk with confidence about the events of a thousand years ago, let alone such colossal periods.

Why doesn't the moon fall to the earth?

The Moon simultaneously rotates both 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 balance is disrupted, a terrible cataclysm may occur. But we are talking about cosmic quantities; no person has the power to influence them. At least at the current level of scientific development.

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 schedule.

And in order to delve into the further description, it is better remember the school physics course:

1. The sun's rays can be reflected from 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 number of rays that will continue their path depends on the ability to reflect.

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

Direct sunlight hits its surface. Some of it remains there, their energy goes to 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 towards us. 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, into which the two powers were drawn. It's about "moon race" when the Americans and Soviet citizens strived for one goal - to be the first to land on the moon.

The USA unconditionally won this competition, which is more offensive - no one Soviet cosmonaut never 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 pass, and no one really aspires to the Moon anymore.

This is motivated by a number of reasons:

• Lack of funding.
• Basic experiments and research have already been carried out.
• There is enough surface data to be processed for the coming decades.
• 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 of them. And then everything stopped. And no other country tried to land to get another reason to be proud.

Tacit agreement seems to be All countries in the world were able to agree on one issue. Maybe somewhere out there, at a distance of about 300 thousand kilometers, there really was contact with something unknown and humanity was opaquely hinted at what further research would entail?

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

The invisible side of the moon

The lunar cycle is 28 days, almost everyone remembers this. The problem is that 28 days fit both periods of rotation - around the Earth and its own axis. It's 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. In fact, 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 that “invisible” half. From the point of view of “science for science’s sake,” this is an unprecedented achievement, but if you think about practical application received data.

True, there is one positive point . We made sure that there was no alien space fleet lurking behind the Moon, that its surface was not dotted with someone’s bases. This is a consolation for paranoids and dreamers.

Above natural phenomena I’m either too lazy to think about it or don’t have time for it. And why we see only one side of the Moon, and why the seasons change - all this was once explained, but too long ago.

Video about the position and rotation of the moon

After watching this video, you will understand why the Moon always faces the earth with the same side:

Why doesn't the moon rotate and we only see one side? June 18th, 2018

As many have already noticed, the Moon always faces the same side towards the Earth. The question arises: is the rotation of these celestial bodies around their axes synchronous relative to each other?

Although the Moon rotates around its axis, it always faces the same side to the Earth, that is, the Moon’s revolution around the Earth and its rotation around its own axis are synchronized. This synchronization is caused by the friction of the tides that the Earth produced in the Moon's shell.

Another mystery: does the Moon rotate on its axis at all? The answer to this question lies in resolving the semantic problem: who is at the forefront - an observer located on Earth (in this case, the Moon does not rotate around its axis), or an observer located in extraterrestrial space (then the only satellite of our planet rotates around its axis).

Let's carry out this simple experiment: draw two circles of the same radius, touching each other. Now imagine them as disks and mentally roll one disk along the edge of the other. In this case, the rims of the discs must be in continuous contact. So, how many times do you think the rolling disk will turn around its axis, making a full revolution around the static disk. Most will say once. To test this assumption, let's take two coins of the same size and repeat the experiment in practice. And what's the result? A rolling coin has time to turn around its axis twice before it makes one revolution around a stationary coin! Surprised?

On the other hand, does a rolling coin rotate? The answer to this question, as in the case of the Earth and the Moon, depends on the observer's frame of reference. Relative to the initial point of contact with the static coin, the moving coin makes one revolution. Relative to an outside observer, during one revolution around a stationary coin, a rolling coin turns twice.

Following the publication of this coin problem in Scientific American in 1867, the editors were literally inundated with letters from indignant readers who held the opposite opinion. They almost immediately drew a parallel between the paradoxes with coins and celestial bodies (Earth and Moon). Those who held the point of view that a moving coin, in one revolution around a stationary coin, manages to turn around its own axis once, were inclined to think about the inability of the Moon to rotate around its own axis. The activity of readers regarding this problem increased so much that in April 1868 it was announced that the debate on this topic was ending in the pages of the Scientific American magazine. It was decided to continue the debate in the magazine The Wheel, specially dedicated to this “great” problem. At least one issue came out. In addition to illustrations, it contained various drawings and diagrams of intricate devices created by readers in order to convince editors that they were wrong.

Various effects generated by the rotation of celestial bodies can be detected using devices like the Foucault pendulum. If it is placed on the Moon, it will turn out that the Moon, rotating around the Earth, rotates around its own axis.

Can these physical considerations serve as an argument confirming the rotation of the Moon around its axis, regardless of the observer’s frame of reference? Oddly enough, but from the point of view general theory relativity probably not. In general, we can assume that the Moon does not rotate at all, it is the Universe that rotates around it, creating gravitational fields like the Moon rotating in motionless space. Of course, it is more convenient to take the Universe as a stationary frame of reference. However, if you think objectively, with regard to the theory of relativity, the question of whether this or that object really rotates or is at rest is generally meaningless. Only relative motion can be “real.”
To illustrate, imagine that the Earth and Moon are connected by a rod. The rod is fixed on both sides rigidly in one place. This is a situation of mutual synchronization - both one side of the Moon is visible from the Earth, and one side of the Earth is visible from the Moon. But this is not the case here; this is how Pluto and Charon rotate. But we have a situation where one end is rigidly fixed to the Moon, and the other moves along the surface of the Earth. Thus, one side of the Moon is visible from the Earth, and different sides of the Earth are visible from the Moon.

Instead of a barbell, the force of gravity acts. And its “rigid attachment” causes tidal phenomena in the body, which gradually either slow down or speed up the rotation (depending on whether the satellite is rotating too fast or too slow).

Some other bodies solar system are also already in such synchronization.

Thanks to photography, we can still see more than half of the surface of the Moon, not 50% - one side, but 59%. There is a phenomenon of libration - the apparent oscillatory movements of the Moon. They are caused by orbital irregularities (not ideal circles), tilts of the rotation axis, and tidal forces.

The Moon is tidally locked into the Earth. Tidal locking is a situation when the period of revolution of a satellite (Moon) around its axis coincides with the period of its revolution around the central body (Earth). In this case, the satellite always faces the central body with the same side, since it rotates around its axis in the same time that it takes for it to orbit around its partner. Tidal locking occurs during mutual motion and is characteristic of many large natural satellites of the planets of the Solar System, and is also used to stabilize some artificial satellites. When observing a synchronous satellite from the central body, only one side of the satellite is always visible. When observed from this side of the satellite, the central body “hangs” motionless in the sky. From the opposite side of the satellite, the central body is never visible.

Facts about the moon

There are lunar trees on Earth

Hundreds of tree seeds were carried to the Moon during the 1971 Apollo 14 mission. Former employee US Forest Service (USFS) Stuart Roosa took the seeds as personal cargo as part of a NASA/USFS project.

Upon returning to Earth, these seeds were germinated and the resulting lunar seedlings were planted throughout the United States as part of the country's bicentennial celebrations in 1977.

There's no dark side

Place your fist on the table, fingers down. You see the back of it. Someone on the other side of the table will see your knuckles. This is roughly how we see the Moon. Because it is tidally locked to our planet, we will always see it from the same perspective.
The concept of the “dark side” of the moon comes from popular culture—think Pink Floyd's 1973 album Dark Side of the Moon and the 1990 thriller of the same name—and actually means the far side, the night side. The one we never see and which is opposite to the side closest to us.

Over a period of time, we see more than half of the Moon, thanks to libration

The Moon moves along its orbital path and moves away from the Earth (at a rate of about one inch per year), accompanying our planet around the Sun.
If you were to zoom in on the Moon as it speeds up and slows down during this journey, you would also see that it wobbles from north to south and west to east in a motion known as libration. As a result of this movement, we see part of the sphere that is usually hidden (about nine percent).

However, we will never see another 41%.

Helium-3 from the Moon could solve energy problems Earth

The solar wind is electrically charged and occasionally collides with the Moon and is absorbed by rocks on the lunar surface. One of the most valuable gases found in this wind and absorbed by the rocks is helium-3, a rare isotope of helium-4 (commonly used for balloons).

Helium-3 is ideal for meeting reactor needs thermonuclear fusion followed by energy generation.

One hundred tons of helium-3 could satisfy the Earth's energy needs for a year, according to Extreme Tech's calculations. The surface of the Moon contains about five million tons of helium-3, while on Earth there is only 15 tons.

The idea is this: we fly to the Moon, extract helium-3 in a mine, put it in tanks and send it to Earth. True, this may not happen very soon.

Is there any truth to the myths about the madness of the full moon?

Not really. The idea that the brain, one of the most watery organs of the human body, is influenced by the moon has its roots in legends going back several millennia to the time of Aristotle.

Since the Moon's gravitational pull controls the tides of Earth's oceans, and humans are 60% water (and 73% brain), Aristotle and the Roman scientist Pliny the Elder believed that the Moon must have a similar effect on ourselves.

This idea gave rise to the term "lunar madness", "Transylvanian effect" (which became widespread in Europe during the Middle Ages) and "lunar madness". 20th century films that linked the full moon with psychiatric disorders, car accidents, murders and other incidents added particular fuel to the fire.

In 2007, the government of the British seaside town of Brighton ordered additional police patrols during full moons (and on paydays too).

And yet science says there is no statistical connection between people's behavior and full moon, according to several studies, one of which was conducted American psychologists John Rotton and Ivan Kelly. It is unlikely that the Moon affects our psyche; rather, it simply adds light, in which it is convenient to commit crimes.

Missing moon rocks

In the 1970s, Richard Nixon's administration distributed rocks recovered from the lunar surface during the Apollo 11 and Apollo 17 missions to leaders of 270 countries.

Unfortunately, more than a hundred of these stones have gone missing and are believed to have ended up on the black market. While working for NASA in 1998, Joseph Gutheinz even conducted a covert operation called " Moon eclipse" to put an end to the illegal sale of these stones.

What was all the fuss about? A piece moonstone the pea-sized one was valued at $5 million on the black market.

The moon belongs to Dennis Hope

At least that's what he thinks.

In 1980, exploiting a loophole in the 1967 UN Space Ownership Treaty that "no country" could lay claim to the solar system, Nevada resident Dennis Hope wrote to the UN and declared the right to private property. They didn't answer him.

But why wait? Hope opened a lunar embassy and began selling one-acre lots for $19.99 each. For the UN, the solar system is almost the same as the world's oceans: outside the economic zone and belonging to every inhabitant of the Earth. Hope claimed to have sold extraterrestrial properties to celebrities and three former US presidents.

It is unclear whether Dennis Hope really does not understand the wording of the treaty or whether he is trying to force the legislature to make a legal assessment of its actions so that the development of celestial resources can begin under more transparent legal conditions.

Sources:

WHY DO WE ONLY SEE ONE SIDE OF THE MOON?

The Moon floats high in the sky, bright, beautiful, with dark spots on its 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 distributed themselves on it in the same way. dark spots, which make it look like a human face. For thousands of years, people have been observing 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 you and I live. But the Moon never shows us its other side, we do not see it. Why?
The Moon rotates around 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 completes its revolution around the Earth, and... it takes the same amount of time to turn around its axis - so slowly does it complete this revolution. And that's the whole point. That's why we always see only one side of her.
But how does this happen? So that you can imagine this more clearly, 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, that will be at hand). This chair will be the imaginary Earth, and you yourself will be the Moon, which revolves 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 will you see it again. This will only confirm that you have turned not only around the table, but also around yourself.
That's how the Moon is. It rotates around the Earth and at the same time around its own axis.
But I must tell you that we still saw the far side of the Moon! How did this happen? Do you remember? .. However, no, you don’t remember this; in those years you were still too young! 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, on 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 back 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, mountain ranges, important peaks, ring crater mountains, circuses.
In February 1966, the world's first rocket, ours, Soviet, landed on the Earth's satellite. It made, as scientists say, a soft landing, which means that it landed on the Moon smoothly, without breaking the equipment, approximately the way a rocket should land on the Moon, on board of which the first explorers will arrive on the Moon. Our rocket, having softly 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 large and accurate; scientists simply pounced on these amazing documents and looked at them carefully; Now they saw what the surface of the Moon was like, what was on it, they affirmed, 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 rocket “Luna-10” was launched again, it began to fly around the Moon, that is, it became its artificial satellite, and the instruments of “Luna-10” sent messages to Earth that Research scientists need them to better know our celestial neighbor.
“Luna-10” made its endless flight around the Moon, so close and familiar, and in the first days the whole world could hear the melody of the Communist anthem “International” coming from it.
Here comes the news again! After Luna-10 there was also Luna-11, Luna-12, and Luna-13, which again made a soft landing on our satellite.
Soviet rockets are constantly soaring into unknown outer space, they are laying 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 onto 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 don’t see the far side of the Moon.

And beautiful, it has attracted the eyes of astronomers since ancient times. Even then, many of its features were noticed: phase changes, sunrise and sunset times, the duration of the lunar month. Ancient scientists also noticed the constancy of the face of the night star. True, in those days they did not ask the question of why the Moon turned one side to the Earth. For them, this was the only possible position, fully consistent with the prevailing beliefs about the structure of the sky.

Today things are a little different. Our ideas about the movement and interaction of space objects, supported by numerous observations, are very different from those that existed in ancient times. And almost everyone knows from school why the Moon is turned to the Earth on one side.

The beginning of the story

Today, one of the secrets that the Moon stubbornly refuses to reveal to us is its origin. Various studies conducted to obtain a definitive answer to this question have so far given rise to several versions. According to one of them, the Moon and Earth are sisters, formed at approximately the same time from a common protoplanetary cloud. This is supported by the results of radioisotope analysis, which made it possible to determine the same age of two cosmic bodies. However, there is also evidence indicating large differences in the composition of our planet and its satellite. A version has been put forward to match them: the Moon was formed somewhere far in space and, approaching the Earth, was captured by it. Close to it is the hypothesis that suggests that several cosmic objects were attracted, which after some time collided and formed the Moon. Finally, there is a theory according to which our planet is more like a mother for its satellite: the Moon appeared as a result of the collision of the Earth with a huge body. The knocked out part subsequently began to rotate in orbit around the “progenitor”.

Satellite-planet system

Be that as it may, all that is known for certain is that the Moon is natural satellite Earth. According to astronomical data, the night star at the time of its formation was located much closer to our planet. Moreover, it flew around the Earth faster and turned first one way or the other. This situation is typical for initial stage evolution of the satellite-planet system. An example of the result of the development of such “relationships” is Pluto and its accompanying Charon. Both cosmic bodies always turn the same side to each other, their rotation is synchronized. But first things first.

Tidal acceleration

The young Moon immediately began to affect the Earth. This was expressed in the formation of tidal waves in the newly formed oceans, as well as in the crust. This effect has two main consequences. Firstly, as a result of certain features and its rotation, the tidal wave is ahead of the Moon. The entire mass of our planet contained in such waves, in turn, affects the satellite, gives it acceleration, and the Moon begins to move faster, gradually moving away from the Earth. Secondly, in this process an oppositely directed force appears, inhibiting the movement of the continents. As a result, the speed of rotation of the Earth around its axis decreases, and the length of the day increases.

The Moon is moving away from our planet by about 4 cm per year. However, this is not an eternal process, and the probability of the Earth losing its satellite is negligible. The “escape” of the Moon will end at the moment when the rotation of the Earth around its axis is synchronized with the movement of the satellite in orbit. In this case, our planet will always look at the night star with the same side.

Similar process

It is easy to assume that the answer to the question of why the Moon is turned to the Earth on one side is associated with a similar phenomenon. Indeed, the Earth causes similar tidal waves in the bowels of the satellite. Since our planet is more massive, the force of its impact is much more noticeable. Obeying her, the Moon has long synchronized its rotation with its movement around the Earth. As a result, an always visible and invisible side of the Moon appeared.

A little more than half

An attentive amateur astronomer can quickly discover that the face of the night star does change somewhat. Visible side The moon does not occupy exactly half of it. The orbit of the night star deviates from the plane of rotation of the Earth around the Sun (ecliptic) by approximately 5º. In addition, its axis is shifted by 1.5º relative to the trajectory of the Moon. As a result, up to 6.5º above and below the poles of the satellite are available for observation. This process is called lunar latitude libration. The satellite's longitude fluctuates similarly. It is caused by a change in the speed of the Moon depending on the distance to the Earth. Due to this, the part of the satellite hidden from view is reduced, and the other side of the Moon, illuminated, increases to 7º longitude. So it turns out that in total up to 59% of the lunar surface can be observed.

In the distant future

So, the question of why the Moon always faces the Earth with one side finds an answer in the peculiarities of the influence of the planet’s gravitational force on the satellite. However, as was said, a similar process after a certain time will lead to the fact that the Earth will look at the night star with only one part of it, regardless of what phase the Moon is in. According to the calculations of John Darwin, the grandson of the founder of the theory of evolution, the length of the day at this moment will be equal to fifty days familiar to us. The distance separating the Earth and the Moon will increase by about one and a half times. This will be the very ideal state of the “satellite-planet” system.

Solar tides

There is, however, some probability that the Moon will never be destined to reach sufficient distance. The reason for this possibility lies in solar tides. The daylight has a similar effect to the moon on both the planet and the satellite. If we include this fact in the theoretical construction of the future of the two cosmic bodies, it turns out that at a certain distance from the Earth the Moon will begin to approach again. This reduction in distance will have devastating consequences. When the Moon is at a distance of 2.9, it will be torn apart by gravitational forces.

One more “but”

However, this picture may not be realized. The fact is that according to forecasts, the removal of the Moon, then its approach and, finally, death will take several trillion years. During this time, a catastrophe on a more serious scale may occur, at least for all life on the planet. The Sun will go out, having exhausted all its reserves of stellar fuel. Following this, all conditions of interaction in the planetary system of the star will change.

Study

The other side of the Moon, inaccessible to direct observation, long time was a mystery, literally shrouded in darkness. It only gave me the opportunity to get to know her better. First aircraft The one that photographed about 70% of the surface of the hidden part was the Soviet Luna 3. The images transmitted to Earth showed that the relief of the reverse side was somewhat different from the nature of the visible surface. There were practically no plains of seas here. Only two such formations were discovered, later named the Sea of ​​Moscow and the Sea of ​​Dreams.

giant crater

In 1965, the Zond-3 spacecraft headed towards the Moon. He completed filming the invisible part of the satellite. The image of the remaining 30% of the surface only confirmed the earlier conclusions: the surface in this part is covered with craters and mountains, but there are practically no seas on it.

The most impressive size is one of the craters, located exactly on dark side Moons. Its length is 2250 km and its depth is 12 km.

Hypotheses

Today the mysteries have largely been solved. However, it is common for the human mind to fantasize about those things and phenomena that are inaccessible to direct observation. Therefore, on the Internet it is easy to come across the most bizarre hypotheses related to the entire Moon as a whole or only to its hidden side. There are assumptions about the artificial origin of the satellite, its population by extraterrestrial intelligence and the deliberate concealment of one of the parties. There are also references to a mysterious space base located on the dark part of the satellite. Such versions are quite difficult to both confirm and refute. No matter how true or false they may be, they are based on the same reason that prompted people to explore space: the hope of finding fellow humans in the vast expanses of the Universe, the desire to touch the unknown.

However, today it is known quite precisely why the Moon is turned to the Earth on one side. And the assumption of artificial origin did not receive any serious continuation. The answer to this question became as obvious as the understanding of what phase the Moon is in today and why. It is impossible, however, to say that we know everything about the earth’s satellite and no discoveries are expected in the future. On the contrary, the night luminary matches the ancient deities who personified it, remains mysterious and is in no hurry to share secrets. Humanity still has to learn a lot of interesting things about the satellite of our planet. Maybe, new stage The study that began quite recently will bear fruit in the near future. It is absolutely certain that the implementation of some NASA projects is of great importance in this sense. Among them is Avatar, which consists of developing a telepresence suit. It will allow, while on Earth, to conduct experiments on the Moon with the help of robots. Great hopes are also placed on the colonization project, the implementation of which will result in the placement of a scientific base on the satellite of our planet.

Why do we only see one side of the Moon?

The Moon floats high in the sky, bright, beautiful, with dark spots on its 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 the 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 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 you and I live. But the Moon never shows us its other side, we do not see it. Why?

The Moon rotates around 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 completes its revolution around the Earth, and... it takes the same amount of time to turn around its axis - so slowly does it complete this revolution. And that's the whole point. That's why we always see only one side of her.

But how does this happen? So that you can imagine this more clearly, 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, that will be at hand). This chair will be the imaginary Earth, and you yourself will be the Moon, which revolves around the Earth. Start moving around the table, remaining facing it the entire 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 will you see it again . This will only confirm that you have turned not only around the table, but also around yourself, your axis.

That's how the Moon is. It rotates around the Earth and at the same time around its own axis.

But everyone now knows that we finally saw the far side of the Moon! How did this happen? Do you remember?.. However, no, you don’t remember this: in those years you were still too young! And this happened in 1959, when Soviet scientists launched an automatic station towards the Moon, which flew around our satellite and transmitted images from the 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, and circuses.

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

Having softly 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 and accurate: scientists simply pounced on these amazing documents and looked at them carefully; Now they saw what the surface of the Moon was like, what was on it, they affirmed 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 that, in March 1966, Luna 10 was launched.

She began to fly around the Moon, that is, she became its artificial satellite, and the Luna-10 instruments sent messages to Earth that scientific researchers needed to better know our celestial neighbor.

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

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

However, the news recent years amazing! American astronauts spaceship Apollo 11, Neil Armstrong, Edwin Aldrin and Michael Collins were the first to fly to the Moon in July 1969, two of them, Neil Armstrong and Edwin Aldrin, stepped on its surface, the third, Michael Collins, was waiting for them, 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 go into space and see our planet Earth from the outside.

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

Really, all this 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 first we were going to talk about only one thing: why we don’t see the far side of the Moon.

Falling stars

I don’t know about you, but I have always loved looking at the sky on quiet, cloudless evenings. I loved finding constellations, some were difficult to find, others were easy, such as Ursa Major or Cassiopeia.

On dark August nights, when the sky becomes completely black, a wide, bright road of stars - the Milky Way - is clearly visible. I stood for a long time with my head thrown back, so that my neck ached, and admired the dark sky, the stars and the silver moon.

But... what is this? A fiery dot traced the sky and went out. “The star has fallen,” say those who saw it.

Star? No, this is something completely different, because stars do not fall. These are small pebbles and specks of dust that fly through outer space and with terrible speed, attracted by the Earth, fly into the atmosphere and burn up! We see this short flash and say: the star has fallen!

Little celestial guests that burn up somewhere very high above the Earth are called meteors.

In August, October and November, the Earth encounters especially a lot of cosmic dust, clouds, and pebbles during its journey around the Sun. That is why at this time you can often see fiery flashes in the sky. This means that the Earth encountered whole swarms of meteors and “space debris” on its way, and it flared up as it flew into our atmosphere.

It happens that dozens of meteors immediately flash in the sky and the “star shower” continues until the Earth passes the meteor shower.

A shower of stars fell over Moscow more than twenty years ago, in 1946. Only we couldn’t observe it because the sky was covered with clouds. It was very annoying!

And there are not rains, but simply stellar showers! But this happens very rarely. At the end of the last century, several such showers occurred; they could be observed both in the skies of America and over Europe. It was a magnificent fireworks display created by nature itself.

Star showers, and especially star showers, are an exceptional phenomenon. You can live your life and not see them. But we can always observe lonely fiery dots flashing and extinguishing in the dark August sky, lonely “shooting stars”. Just remember: these are not stars - stars never fall! This - cosmic dust. Dust grains flare up due to strong air resistance when they fly into the earth's atmosphere. They flash and go out!

Why is there day and night?

I woke up at eight o'clock. Outside the window it’s night time! I remembered that today is December 22nd, the day winter solstice, when we in the Northern Hemisphere experience the longest night of the year and the shortest day.

That year there was no snow for a long time, or rather, there was snow, but it didn’t lie there for a long time - it melted. Mud, puddles, piercing wind and darkness - at four o'clock in the afternoon you need to turn on the lights!

I don’t like this time of year, the time of very late, prolonged autumn, and I always look forward to the cherished December 22nd, when the sun, as they say, turns to summer, and winter to frost. After the winter solstice, the days begin to gradually increase, and the nights begin to shorten, at first for just a minute, and then you see - in a month and an hour it will increase. But winter is coming into its own: frosts are cracking, snow is falling, and the twilight turns blue, almost purple...

Day and night... Change of light and darkness... The most ordinary, most constant, unchanging phenomenon of nature, it goes on forever in a routine manner. But why is this happening?

Once upon a time, in ancient times, not only children, but also adults asked themselves this question and did not find the correct answer to it. Millennia passed before man understood and explained this phenomenon.