The Far Side Of The Moon

The other side

When you look up at the silver moon, you might notice the shadows and shapes on its face from one night to another. You see the same side of the moon that our ancestors did.

Only one side of the moon side is ever visible from earth. It was not until 1959 when the soviet spacecraft lunar 3 orbited the moon and sent pictures home that human beings were able to see the far side of the moon for the first time.

Tidal locking

A phenomenon called Tidal Locking is responsible for the consistent view. The Earth and Moon are very close and exert gravitational forces on each other. These forces slows down the rotation of both bodies.

Now the moon takes the one trip around the earth in same amount of time it takes t make one rotation around its axis, about 28 days. From Earth, we always see the same face of the Moon. from the Moon, the Earth stands still in the sky.

The near side of the Moon is well known because we can see it. Although the far side of the moon is not visible, so it is not accurate to say that it is the dark side of the moon. All sides of the moon experience night and day just like on earth.

With modern satellites astronaughts have completely mapped the lunar surface. A chinese mission chang'e 4, is exploring the far side of the moon, the first such mission ever landed there.

Radio darkness

Being shielded from civilizations means the far side of the moon is - radio dark. There researchers can measure weak signals from universe that otherwise are drowned. Chang'e 4 for instance will be able to observe low frequency radio light coming from the sun and beyond thats impossible to detect here on earth due to human activity, such as TV, radio and other forms of communication signals.

Reasearchers are getting closer to explring the moons polar craters, some of which have never the light of day. They are so deep and just in the right place where no light can reach. There are certainly dark parts, if not dark side of the moon.