Comments on: Do we all see the same moon phase from Earth?

By: Moon Phases in the Southern Hemisphere – Emily's Astronomy Blog

Moon Phases in the Southern Hemisphere – Emily's Astronomy Blog — Thu, 19 Jan 2023 04:12:17 +0000

[…] picture below shows the difference between hemispheres, and this website does a good job of explaining […]

By: Day 12 – The Waxing Moon – Niki Flow

Day 12 – The Waxing Moon – Niki Flow — Tue, 04 Oct 2022 07:03:02 +0000

[…] **Regarding Milestone 211, the waxing moon, I know for those of us in the Northern Hemisphere, this photo shows a waning moon. However, since Sir Peter Jackson created the marvelous films in the southern hemisphere, I thought the moon should be oriented that way too. For an informative article explaining moon orientation, check out this EarthSky post: “Do We All See the Moon the Same Moon Phase?” […]

By: Claudia Crowley

Claudia Crowley — Wed, 30 Jan 2019 09:58:00 +0000

In reply to athena. Here's my take on it, and I'm not an astronomer: The lit half of the moon always points toward the sun. As the sun goes "beneath" the Earth, the moon changes the direction that it's pointing in.

By: athena

athena — Tue, 29 Jan 2019 10:48:00 +0000

How come the phases of the moon appear differently (not sure proper description but by different I mean instead vertical light on half and half ) Im seeing the moon go from vertical lighting (side to side ) to vertical lighting , top and bottom, all in one night. Ive always lived in the same state and have always looked at the sky and moon and never have seen this before in fifty years. Im perplexed on what would cause this and Im also perplexed when I tried to find information on moon phases – the moon phase charts are now changing to reflect the moon horizontally dark and light. What has caused this change. Again, I have lived in the same state all my life so Im not interested in the explanation of how someone in Australia sees the moon, I get that. I dont get what I have been seeing. Especially the one night about month ago when thru telescope the moon was dark on one vertical half and light on one vertical half. Then about three hours later I looked again and it was Light horizontally on the top and dark on the bottom.

By: lurch369

lurch369 — Tue, 29 Jan 2019 02:26:00 +0000

Wishing for higher resolution photos in the future. These are pretty tiny images.

By: Claudia Crowley

Claudia Crowley — Mon, 28 Jan 2019 17:38:00 +0000

In reply to Eliz.

The gravitational interaction of the moon and Earth causes it. It’s called tidal locking and is found in other moons in the solar system too. There is a good animated diagram on the Wikipedia page showing how the moon rotates as it revolves and what it would look like if it didn’t rotate plus a lot more information:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tidal_locking

By: rick foster

rick foster — Mon, 28 Jan 2019 14:33:00 +0000

Thanx Kit for the info on the Moon’s rotation. I pondered the same as Eliz. This is particularly interesting given Chiina’s recent Moon mission to the ‘dark’ side by placing a rely satellite first. What new information could they send back?

By: Eliz

Eliz — Mon, 28 Jan 2019 13:57:00 +0000

It seems an incredible coincidence that the moon’s rotation matches its orbit so that one side always faces the earth. Is there a law of gravity or motion that makes this natural occurrence not unusual?

By: Claudia Crowley

Claudia Crowley — Mon, 28 Jan 2019 10:22:00 +0000

In reply to rick foster. It does spin, but just once every revolution around Earth. That's why we see only one side.

By: rick foster

rick foster — Sat, 26 Jan 2019 17:24:00 +0000

Fascinating explanation! How is it the Moon doesn’t spin on it’s axis?