Dark Side of the moon

Dark Side of the moon

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geeks

9,121 posts

138 months

Thursday 3rd January 2019
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RobGT81 said:
Unless the Yanks kick on with Space X and NASA come up with something, you can see the Chinese starting to dominate space.
One Rover on the Moon doesn't make them a space super power. Lets not forget the whole ISS and Rovers on Mars now...

Eric Mc

121,784 posts

264 months

Thursday 3rd January 2019
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Dog Star said:
Anyway - to the subject in hand - I'm with the poster a few up there ^^^ I have no belief whatsoever that there's any true science motivation for this (having said that there wasn't initially with Apollo), it's a technology demonstration that they've "arrived" and heaven knows what they'll be up to where they cannot be seen.
100% the reason they've done it. But who cares about the motivation. They HAVE done it and we will learn stuff along the way.

Let's talk about the mission.

Next step is to get the rover down off the lander.

Eric Mc

121,784 posts

264 months

Thursday 3rd January 2019
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ash73 said:
Why is it red?
The lunar surface can show various hues depending on sun angles and the properties of the cameras (and film - in the old days) .

Even the human eyeball can see colour variations. The Apollo astronauts found that looking towards the sun, the surface had a golden, yellowish hue. If they looked down sun, it was more of a powdery grey. In reality, it is actually very dark and has a charcoal grey look to it. On average, the moon only reflects back only about 5% of the sunlight that falls on it - which indicates how dark it really is.

Even through a telescope or binoculars, subtle colour variations are visible. To my eyes, some areas of the lunar mare have a distinct purplish tinge to them.

Ayahuasca

27,427 posts

278 months

Thursday 3rd January 2019
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Have they said what the purpose of the mission is, or what science they hope to do?

mickk

28,772 posts

241 months

Thursday 3rd January 2019
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We need more pictures.

Cobnapint

8,597 posts

150 months

Thursday 3rd January 2019
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Eric Mc said:
100% the reason they've done it. But who cares about the motivation. They HAVE done it and we will learn stuff along the way.

Let's talk about the mission.

Next step is to get the rover down off the lander.
Learn stuff? Like what? The US took all the low hanging fruit.

If they do find anything you can bet they'll be keeping it to themselves. China isn't a western friendly nation, despite the smiles. President Xi has given himself endless power, he's building container ports everywhere, militarising the coral islands in the south China sea, building military bases all around the SCS and had just threatened Taiwan with military action.
Nice chap.

Eric Mc

121,784 posts

264 months

Thursday 3rd January 2019
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ash73 said:
Can't imagine why charcoal grey would appear red in any knd of light, must be a weird camera or they landed on Moho by mistake wink

It's not 100% charcoal grey anywhere.

However, there are also lots of microscopic glass shards in lunar regolith which can refract and reflect light in odd ways. It's also a real bugger as it makes lunar dust extremely abrasive.

Here's a cross section of lunar regolith from one of the mare regions and you can see the variety of materials that are contained in this stuff -




Eric Mc

121,784 posts

264 months

Thursday 3rd January 2019
quotequote all
Cobnapint said:
Learn stuff? Like what? The US took all the low hanging fruit.

If they do find anything you can bet they'll be keeping it to themselves. China isn't a western friendly nation, despite the smiles. President Xi has given himself endless power, he's building container ports everywhere, militarising the coral islands in the south China sea, building military bases all around the SCS and had just threatened Taiwan with military action.
Nice chap.
There is loads of stuff to learn about the moon,. If you think otherwise, my advice would be to join on of the OU courses on the moon (as I did a year or so ago). It's good stuff and shows what a variable place the moon actually is. Apollo barely scratched (literally) the surface.

Don't forget, Apollo only landed in six areas - all of them on mare or on the edges of mare - and all of them fairly close to the lunar equator. Although science was considered when selecting landing sites, especially with the last three missions, these sites were chosen as much for safety and technical reasons as for pure science. It's only in the last 20 years that we have begun to explore the other 95% of the moon using robot probes - and it's turning out to be a far more interesting place than we originally thought.

Also, more modern examinations of the Apollo material (over 800 pounds of it) has revealed new insights that were missed 40 plus years ago by the original examinations.

I would also highly recommend this book if you want to learn about the lunar science conducted by Apollo (technicially referred to as selenology) of the moon -





Terminator X

14,922 posts

203 months

Thursday 3rd January 2019
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Eric Mc said:
For goodness sake guys, can we have a bit of positivity here.

The moon most certainly has not been done to death by anyone. There is a lot to learn about the moon and we will not understand it properly for many, many years.

This is a genuine and interesting space "first" for China and they should be congratulated on their success.
Agreed. More importantly we don't seem to understand our own weird rock all that well either yet space exploration soaks up billions of Dollars, go figure.

TX.

Eric Mc

121,784 posts

264 months

Thursday 3rd January 2019
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Terminator X said:
Agreed. More importantly we don't seem to understand our own weird rock all that well either yet space exploration soaks up billions of Dollars, go figure.

TX.
Would the world of medical science be any good if it only ever had one patient to study. "Comparative Planetology" is now a recognised science in its own right and, in another life, it is something I would have loved to study.

Caruso

7,422 posts

255 months

Thursday 3rd January 2019
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It's good to see some new science on the surface of the moon. No doubt there is more than 1 agenda for the Chinese - as well as scientific there will be territorial and political angles.

Eric Mc

121,784 posts

264 months

Thursday 3rd January 2019
quotequote all
No doubt about that at all.

The moon has re-emerged as a worthwihle destination for space exploration over the past 20 odd years - and all the major space faring nations and agencies have various lunar programmes in progress or planned. It's getting quite busy up there.

garagewidow

1,502 posts

169 months

Thursday 3rd January 2019
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ash73 said:
snake_oil said:
thumbup

Well, touchdown. First pic released.

Why is it red?
Whoops looks like they forgot to change the studio floodlights back to natural light.

Cobnapint

8,597 posts

150 months

Thursday 3rd January 2019
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I say again. The Chinese aren't there for innocent exploration, they are there for exploitation. They could quite easily have landed on this side, saving themselves the bother of having to relay the comms back, but no, out of view (although I'm sure the yanks have the optics on something up there to keep an eye on them) and in a massive crater, which will save them having to drill too far to see what lies beneath.

They've already changed their story as to why they are there.

Eric Mc

121,784 posts

264 months

Thursday 3rd January 2019
quotequote all
You are too gullible.

They wanted to have a bona fide space "first". This was one of the last ones available that didn't involve sending something billions of miles into the furthest regions of the solar system (e.g New Horizons).

I have no doubt that they might want to exploit the moon. That isn't any sort of mystery. They are a long way from doing that - yet. But studying the geology and science is a beginning step.

Beati Dogu

8,862 posts

138 months

Thursday 3rd January 2019
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Toaster

2,938 posts

192 months

Thursday 3rd January 2019
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Eric Mc said:
The probe is landing on the FAR side of the moon - which will be nicely lit up by the sun and far from dark at the moment the probe/rover lands.
Its not always daylight it does have a night phase so could be called the dark side during its night cycles biggrin

The Dangerous Elk

4,642 posts

76 months

Thursday 3rd January 2019
quotequote all
ash73 said:
snake_oil said:
thumbup

Well, touchdown. First pic released.

Why is it red?
Because it is Leicester not Cheddar

MartG

20,623 posts

203 months

Thursday 3rd January 2019
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Yutu 2 rover now on the surface

https://twitter.com/AJ_FI/status/10808412670498283...



Edited by MartG on Thursday 3rd January 18:06

Register1

2,131 posts

93 months

Thursday 3rd January 2019
quotequote all
Absolutely amazing, hat's off to them.
They could have picked a nice easy place to land their first rover buggy.
But no, let's go to the other side, where no one has landed before.
And while we are at it, why don't we pinpoint the landing in the deepest crater.

Well done China


Edited by Register1 on Thursday 3rd January 19:15