Curiosities of the Moon

The Earth's moon, the only place beyond Earth that man has trodden on, is the fifth largest moon in the solar system and the brightest and largest object in our night sky.

These first brushstrokes on the Moon you may already know, as well as the fact that it also causes tides, for example, that have created a guide that has served humans for thousands of years.

The fact that it is simply called Luna, even though we know that there are many more, is precisely because when it was discovered in the sky, the fact that there were other moons was unknown. It was not until 1610 when the well-known Italian astronomer Galileo Galilei observed four moons in orbit around Jupiter, when we realized that detail. Be that as it may, our Moon still represents the only natural satellite that our blue planet possesses.

Interesting facts about the Moon:

It is at an average distance from Earth of 238,855 | 384,400 kilometers

Its period of rotation and orbit: 27.32 Earth days

Equatorial Radio: 1,737.5 kilometers

Mass in kilograms: 7.35 x 10 ^ 22 (0.0123 of Earth)

Gravity: 0.166 of the Earth (If you weigh 45 kilograms on Earth, you weigh 7.5 kilograms on the Moon)

Temperature range: -248 to 123 ºC

Regarding its size, the Moon is 400 times smaller than the Sun; however, it is 400 times closer to Earth, hence the apparent size of both bodies seen from Earth is practically the same.

Among other things, the change of the position of the Moon with respect to the Sun gives rise to the phases of the Moon. When the Moon is between Earth and the Sun, we can not see the Moon, hence this phase is called New Moon. When the Earth is between the Sun and the Moon, the part of the Moon closest to Earth is half illuminated, hence we call this phase Full Moon. Finally, when the Moon is in intermediate positions, we see only a quarter of the Moon, hence we extract the phase of crescent or waning, depending if the illuminated part visible from the Earth tends to grow or dwindle.