Far side of the moon revealed in amazing mosaic of orbiter images!

Originally posted by gabbermatt

Originally posted by nataylor

Originally posted by gabbermatt
That's the very first thing that came to my mind when i saw this..... How does the side facing us have larger craters than the side exposed to space? It's really strange...

I'm curious how you are thinking the near side has larger craters than the far side. So we can compare apple to apples, here are the two sides in the same kind of orthographic view:

Near side:

Far side:

The far side definitely looks more heavily cratered to me.

I didn't say more... i said larger

There's 3 on the side facing us that i see at a quick glance that are massive compared to any of the ones on the far side.

Those are not craters...they are basaltic plains formed by volcanic eruptions.

reply to post by Soylent Green Is People


It was believed Mercury was tidally locked to the sun but more recent observations show it is not so. Venus is nearly tidally locked to the sun with a 2/3 day year ratio, meaning 2 years on Venus is only 3 days on Venus, consistently (and it is upside down, but for another debate). Each day on Mercury lasts as long as 58 days, 15 hours on Earth. This is quite a feat, considering a whole year on Mercury is only 88 (earth) days.

reply to post by Cyanhide


why is there a seam down the middle of this moon?did they cut somthing out?

reply to post by diceshadow7


Please read the rest of this thread. Your question has been answered several times.

Thanks!

I expected most of the back half of the moon to have HUGE chunks missing or Enormous craters much larger than those seen from earths view. It just makes sense that since the moon stands between the earth and outer space acting as a "shield" of sorts that it would take hits on the backside that would have otherwise hit earth and therefore show more damage than the side facing us. Considering the Earth also blocks the moon as a "shield" of sorts I would naturally think there to be much much larger craters on the dark side. Though the pictures do support a much larger amount of craters I'm surprised there isn't more damage. So now all we have to do is colonize it by building huge domes and subterranean enclosures, transfer solar panels,plants, people and water etc and we can start seeding the stars as was intended for all our biological species continued growth and survival

reply to post by CaptainKostr


It is small and relatively far away, so it isn't much of a shield:

[atsimg]http://files.abovetopsecret.com/images/member/fee707fd0e82.jpg[/atsimg]

I would think all parts of the Moon have been almost equally bombarded, Granted, the side facing the Earth may be slightly shielded by the Earth, but probably not shielded that much.

reply to post by Soylent Green Is People


Eh, I was just thinking that based on all possible angles of attack over billions of years with one side of the moon consistently facing in earths direction that statistically there would be less impacts on the side facing earth and more impacts on the side facing away from the earth. Given that the earths surface is a little over 70% water it hides impacts relatively well while on the other hand, the moons dusty surface shows impacts created over billions of years relatively well. Based on the number of impacts on the far side of the moon we can further extrapolate that the earth while rotating has in all probability recieved at least as many impacts as the far side of the moon. But I don't know, thats just my guess.

In fact, given that the side of the moon facing earth shows groups of very large craters that were apparently filled with lava I would think some very large objects hit it. The fact also that this side faces earth may mean that earth was hit as well during this same period of impacts given the "line of sight" issue and perhaps an impact of such magnitude may very well be what broke the continents apart and or created an Ice age. I'm guessing again, but who knows?