is the moon equally cold all the way around ?

Question

I read it was colder in the dark shadowed side.

Answer 1

Like the Earth and Mercury, the Moon is hotter in areas where there is sunlight than where it is dark. You need to have a very thick atmosphere (like Venus's) to make it as hot on the leeward side as on the sunward side. (I say "sunward" and "leeward" here, because Venus's atmosphere is so thick that even at high noon it is pitch black.)

Without an atmosphere, it gets pretty hot and pretty cold. Sunlit areas of the Moon are about 250°F, while the dark parts go down to about -200°F. The astronauts who walked on the Moon wore specially padded boots to protect them from the heat, and had similar padding on their gloves to protect them when they picked up hot rocks.

By the way, Mercury, being closer to the Sun, gets to be about 1100°F on the sunlit side and -300°F on the dark side. But Mercury is gravitationally locked to the Sun, and its dark side always faces away from the Sun and never gets heated.

Answer 2

NO!!! Emphatically NO. There IS NO "DARK SIDE". All parts of the moon experience night and day as it revolves around the Earth. The moon has a locked rotation where one side perpetually faces the Earth and the other side is the FAR SIDE that never sees the Earth in its sky. But it still rotates nevertheless. As it completes one rotation around its axis in the same time that it completes one revolution around the Earth, all parts of the moon experiences 14 days of daylight and 14 days of night. THAT IS WHY YOU ALL SEE THE MOON GO THROUGH PHASES.

Now, it is thought that there are deep craters near the lunar poles that almost never get any sunlight at the bottom, and that there probably is frozon water (from comets?) on the floor of these craters. But these are very limited areas.

Just remember that the "dark side" of the moon is just a song by Pink Floyd. Check your facts for yourself. I'm right on this one.

BTW TychaBrahe is incorrect about Mercury's "day". One rotation on its axis is 59 days, while its "year" is 88 days. Thus even Mercury experiences full day and night all over the planet. This has been known to scientists since 1965, but many books STILL include outdated information.

Answer 3

Yes. It is colder on the dark side of the moon. The moon does rotate but you'll never see the other side of the moon unless you travel there. It rotates at just the right speed to always show us only one face.

Answer 4

Because there is no atmosphere to distribute the heat the Moon is hot and cold depending on where sunlight hits. In the sun it is hot and in the shade it is cold. It is definitely not an even temperature all around.

Answer 5

No. The surface temperature of the moon changes significantly depending upon the position of the moon with respect to the sun. The portion of the moon's surface exposed to the sun at all points of its revolution are much warmer than the portion of the moon not exposed to the sun.

Answer 6

It would be colder in the shadow but not by much. The reason we have our weather is not due to the sun per se but rather the atmosphere we experience. If we didn't have the atmosphere, the planet would be more like the moon.

Answer 7

Always cooler on the dark side. The moon does get sunlight on the other side.... The moon always shows it's same side to Earth, not the sun.

Answer 8

It is probably colder on the dark side becuase it never gets any sunlight but then the moon is always cold ....

Answer 9

as siderealand synodic period of moon same: about 50% of its surface never Ge5\ts sun light resulting in temperature difference between the lighted and shadowed side.

Answer 10

It should be colder all the way round, actually I havn't been there yet.