Origins of the Moon
The moon came into being about 4.5 million years ago when the Earth and another planet, the size of Mars, collided. The planet that hit the Earth was destroyed and the rock fragments left after the impact began to orbit the Earth. It took about a century for the moon to form and it’s been there ever since circling the Earth.
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April 20th to 4th May 2002- A conjunction
Over the next few weeks we’ll be able to see 5 planets listed at the top of the page, early in the evening. The amazing thing is that they will be in a line with the moon. This is called a conjunction.
There have only been about 12 of these in the last 1000 years. Now is your chance to see it. It’s exciting that something so unusual is happening in the new millennium and we are here to witness it. You should be able to see the spectacle from April 20th and the dazzling conjunction on May 4th. The BBC say the best view is in the Northern Hemisphere near the equator. Kenya is in this location just over the equator.
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1796-Distance betwen the Sun and Earth Calculated
When this happened in the 18th Century it gave a scientist called Sir Edmond Halley an idea. He thought that it should be possible to work out how far away the sun was from Earth. The famous English explorer Captain J. Cook sailed to Tahiti in 1769 to make the measurement. He was able to work out that the distance from Earth to the sun was 95 million miles. In the 21st Century we believe that the distance is 92 million miles. Not much different between the caculations then and now..
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Space Travel
Not many people have been into space. The Russian cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin was the first to orbit the Earth. 1969 was when the first Moon landing took place. NASA and The Russian Space Agency are working together building a space station. The Russian’s have allowed tourists to visit it.
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Space visit
That would be something special and a great adventure. To board the Space Shuttle and blast off for space. Then orbit twice around the world. First stop the space station. Have lunch there, a plate of ‘Plov’ or a ‘Space Shuttle Hamburger.’ Afterwards we could play football in the Space Shuttle’s hold. There may be time for a space walk too! There is no harm in dreaming. Great trip if we could go though. Who would come? It is very costly and thousands of dollars would be needed!
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Space Probes
Our space visit would not let us go far into space. The longer journeys into space have been made by unmanned space probes. There have been lots of them. In the 1970’s there was the Voyager Mission. In 2004 the joint U.S European Cassini space probe will visit Saturn.
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Other Solar Systems
We know for sure that the only planet in space with life on it is ours. We are the only known living beings to travel into space. This might not be for long because scientists have found a solar system in the Big Dipper constellation. Here two planets have been found orbiting a sun. In our solar system they would be between Mars and Jupiter. It is possible that a planet the size of Earth and the same distance from the sun could exist. If it did then it would mean that there is another planet like us in space.
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E.T
There could very well be Extra Terrestrial people living on the planet. If this is so then we would not be alone. Depending on which planet you lived on the other would be inhabited by space aliens!!! They would have a verey strange impression of Earth if they can tune into our T.V transmitions. In England, the Astronomer Royal, Sir Martin Rees thinks that E.T life could exists in the Universe.
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