The Sky Was Black On The Moon?

reply to post by Deaf Alien


I just finished reading Gene cernan's biography, and his recounts of his career.

It's title is Last Man on the Moon.

I recommend it, to answer many of the questions posed in this thread.

If you will recall, Eugene Cernan was the commander of Apollo 17. As a result, he WAS the last Human (so far) to step foot on the Moon.

Gene Cernan also flew on Gemini (was second American to conduct a 'spacewalk'...THAT is quite a story, BTW...)

Gene Cernan also was LM pilot on Apollo 10. That mission was the 'trial run' that preceded Apollo 11. In fact, there was NO GUARANTEE that Apollo 11 would result in a landing. A lot depended on how well EACH mission progressed, and how the data was collected, to be used for the next mission.

It's all in his book.

reply to post by DJW001


I played that part in that movie over and over again few times. The astronauts all said that the sky was pitch black, "a sky blacker than black", etc. And that's from their very own mouths during the interviews.

Originally posted by -PLB-
reply to post by Korg Trinity

 

We don't really know what action they undertook to see the stars. Maybe they tried but didn't get a good view and gave up. Even if they had not tried I would not find it odd. Maybe they were even briefed that the stars would be hard to see because of the bright light.

Watch the video above.... their answers were nothing like what you describe...

If you are right then I would have thought they would have said something like....

"we tried to look at the stars, we really wanted to see what the stars looked like from the surface but couldn't see them because of the strength of filtering on our suites"

What they actually said was...

"we didn't see any stars... ermm I don't recall seeing any stars"

This is the reaction of someone being presented with something that challenges their memories and yet their intelligent mind shouts loudly at them "You SHOULD have been able to see stars... Maybe I did but forgot.. Why did I forget??"

Hence the hesitation and the I don't recall statement...

Korg.

reply to post by Deaf Alien


It's hard to say, it does kinda make sense that as the astronauts were on the daytime side there would be no stars as the photons emitted from the sun are blocking the stars light the same as Earth.
I think what confuses some people is the fact that the moons sky is black due to no atmosphere. We associate a black sky with stars becase it's night time here. So seeing a black sky can be deceptive.

If the Earth had 0 atmosphere im guessing the sky would be black in day time aas well but that doesnt mean we would see stars would it? I'm only guessing on that last part.

Maybe if we landed closer to the light horizon on the moon they would have seen stars like we begin to at dusk / dawn.

I could be wrong but that makes sense to me.

reply to post by ppk55


Maybe with the lower gravity they wanted to increase their handicap

[edit on 20-4-2010 by Havick007]

reply to post by Havick007

It's hard to say, it does kinda make sense that as the astronauts were on the daytime side there would be no stars as the photons emitted from the sun are blocking the stars light the same as Earth.

No it's not the same as Earth. On Earth, the sun light is scattered in the atmosphere which is why you can not see the stars.

On the moon, there is zero atmosphere for the light to scatter. The sun rays do not block out the star lights.

Doesn't matter if it was daytime on the moon.

reply to post by Korg Trinity


I sounds more like somebody who didn't give it too much attention because he was too busy with other things.

Here's a link with some nice pics of stars in space from the space station

spaceflight.nasa.gov...

Also i was just reading a couple of articles that kinda relate to the topc i will also post links to the full articles at the bottom of my post

Don Pettit, science officer for the international space station, who wrote:

"You see stars and planets and our galaxy on edge."

Science Officer and Flight Engineer Edward T. Lu wrote this:

Mars ... is bright enough that even when we are on the lit side of the Earth, and with all the lights on inside, it is clearly visible against the black background of space.

spaceflight.nasa.gov...

spaceflight.nasa.gov...


Cheers

reply to post by Deaf Alien


oh ok well hmm im stumped

Originally posted by -PLB-
reply to post by Korg Trinity

 

I sounds more like somebody who didn't give it too much attention because he was too busy with other things.

I'm sorry but I very much doubt that they were soooo busy that they didn't attempt to see the stars...

That's a really weak explanation.

Korg.

reply to post by Deaf Alien


Regardless, we all understand the refraction of the Earth's atmosphere, relative to the Sun being above the horizon, and 'washing out' the stars.

People seem to forget that nearby planets, such as VENUS, are nevertheless visible, from Earth, when the Sun is 'up'.

Yes, the Earth's atmosphere has the effect, because of the Sun's dominance, when above the horizon, of making it ineffectual to see the far, far dimmer (by comparison) distant stars.

Compare to accounts during Total Solar Eclipses....when the 'stars' came out.

Compare, also, to the Human Eye, and its iris, and HOW the eye works, in bright light.

Consider the 'night adaptation' phenomenon, as it relates to the Human eye.

UNDERSTAND, please, what all of that means, when applied to the ability of the Human eye to adjust, after looking at a landscape (or moonscape) that is brightly lit, then casting eyes upward, to attempt to pick out individual (and, again, by comparison, VERY dim) stars....

AT night, on Earth....use the simple example of looking at a bright light, THEN trying to spot stars in the sky.

Similar principle.

MOST people comprehend this implicitly.

reply to post by Korg Trinity


So what is your explanation? That they weren't there? You seriously think that explanation is better?

It is such a hard subject to debate as we have to rely on other people's word. When we can go and see it for ourselves then we can know 100% what the truth is.
Maybe the astronauts should have been able to see stars.

I can understand why in photos taken by them there are none, they would have to really overexpose the film to get stars on the photo wouldnt they?

Originally posted by Deaf Alien
reply to post by ppk55

 

The moon would be an astronomers dream place with no annoying atmoshpere to get in the way.

Thank you. That's exactly what I've been saying. It all doesn't make any sense.

They were on the surface during the lunar day. The reflected light from the surface would constrict your pupils to the point you could not possibly see the stars.

You should, however, be able to construct some sort of cardboard tube or whatnot that would block all the groundlight and sunlight, in which case you ought to be able to see the stars even during the lunar day.

reply to post by weedwhacker

UNDERSTAND, please, what all of that means, when applied to the ability of the Human eye to adjust, after looking at a landscape (or moonscape) that is brightly lit, then casting eyes upward, to attempt to pick out individual (and, again, by comparison, VERY dim) stars.... AT night, on Earth....use the simple example of looking at a bright light, THEN trying to spot stars in the sky.

Even so, it takes only few seconds for the eyes to adjust to the darkness. All the astronauts had to do was look at the sky away from the sun and the surface of the moon and wait a few seconds to observe the stars.

reply to post by Bedlam

They were on the surface during the lunar day. The reflected light from the surface would constrict your pupils to the point you could not possibly see the stars.

Even when they look OUT and AWAY from the surface and looking in the direction opposite the sun in their helmets?

reply to post by Deaf Alien


thank you for this thread. this has puzzeled me since I first heard about it. If you go to Tibet where the atmosphere is thinnest, the night sky is full of beautiful stars, I would have thought the lack of atmosphere would have been fantastic. like you I have never had a precise answer to this question and a few others. which makes me wonder. did we ever really go there at all.

reply to post by Deaf Alien


Two things - the suits aren't that flexible, I'm not sure you could "look up" far enough to get away from the ground light. Also, the suit visors are a big near-hemisphere of glass, you'd have to have some sort of shield to block off the ground light entering the helmet and lighting the inside of it up even if you faced away from the sun.

Second, they kept their sun visors down all the time outside, IIRC. You saw what happened to the camera when Bean gave it just a glancing view of the sun without a filter. I wouldn't want the chance of that happening to my eyes, and so probably would not have raised my visor.

reply to post by Bedlam

Second, they kept their sun visors down all the time outside, IIRC. You saw what happened to the camera when Bean gave it just a glancing view of the sun without a filter. I wouldn't want the chance of that happening to my eyes, and so probably would not have raised my visor.

Like this?

[atsimg]http://files.abovetopsecret.com/images/member/e46e6eab4ed6.jpg[/atsimg]

Originally posted by Deaf Alien
reply to post by Bedlam

 

Like this?

Ok, look at his head inside the helmet. How do you propose that he "look up" in such a way that the ground light is not visible, and can't enter his helmet to illuminate the inside?

(good catch on the photo, all the ones I saw have the orange solar filter down)