• Question: how big is the moon

    Asked by dominika to Adam, Catherine, Karen, Leila, Nazim on 13 Mar 2012.
    • Photo: Leila Battison

      Leila Battison answered on 13 Mar 2012:

      Even though the moon looks much bigger than any of the stars in the sky, it is actually smaller than the Earth, and only looks big because it is so close. It is only about a quarter of the size of the Earth.

      Because it is so small, the gravity on the moon is really weak, which makes bouncing around on the surface really fun (if you are lucky enough to go there!)

    • Photo: Nazim Bharmal

      Nazim Bharmal answered on 13 Mar 2012:

      If you could bring the Moon down to Earth, you could fit two disc diameters into Australia. (A disc is just the way we see a sphere, like the Moon, as a circle from far away.) So in one way, it is not enormous and it is also quite far away since it looks the size of a small coin.

      But don’t forget that it is big enough to affect the tides in the oceans, and a lot of cultures base their calendar on when the moon is full and when it is small (waxing and waning). Plus it can block the sun when you get a solar eclipse. So it is ‘big’ in a lot of different ways!

    • Photo: Adam Stevens

      Adam Stevens answered on 13 Mar 2012:

      This big

      |——————————————————- ~1,700km ————————————————————–|

    • Photo: Karen Masters

      Karen Masters answered on 13 Mar 2012:

      The Moon is surprisingly large for a moon of a small planet (Earth being relatively small really). The Moon is about 1/4 the diameter of the Earth (so 1/32 the volume).

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