back to article Fiery old geysers FOUND ON MOON: Volcanic past explained

The night sky on Earth in its early years was very different, with our Moon glowing red with fire in the sky. Now scientists think they've worked out why. Back when the Moon was forming, the surface was alive with fiery geysers that spurted molten rock high in the low-gravity skies as the orbiting mass cooled and crusted over …

  1. Destroy All Monsters Silver badge
    Headmaster

    MOON - Such a heavy name for such an ethereal object

    The night sky on Earth in its early years was very different, with our Moon glowing red with fire in the sky. Now scientists think they've worked out why.

    As we don't have reliable eyewitness accounts about those times, the last "why" should be replaced by a "that".

    The grammar would be atrocious but the direction of scientific enquiry would be right.

  2. Your alien overlord - fear me
    Boffin

    Appollo 11 - never happened, it was a PR stunt. Later ones, juries still out.

    Now about doing science experiments on so called moon rock under Planet Earth conditions (gravity,having an atmosphere etc.) is the height of stoopidity. If anything it should be done on the ISS (outside obviously).

    1. Hero Protagonist

      > Appollo 11 - never happened, it was a PR stunt.

      Appollo11 may never have happened, but Apollo 11 surely did.

      > Later ones, juries still out.

      How many juries?

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      AYRTS?

      Is anyone?

    3. toughluck

      Being a PR stunt doesn't mean it never happened.

      Moon landings are, in my opinion, the highest historical achievement of mankind and represent the pinnacle of science at their time. That they were PR stunts is immaterial to this.

    4. dotdavid

      "Now about doing science experiments on so called moon rock under Planet Earth conditions (gravity,having an atmosphere etc.) is the height of stoopidity"

      I'm curious; if as you claim the moon rock is faked because we've never been there, what would it matter where we did our science experiments on them?

      1. g e

        Huff post has a cracking debunk of lunar conspiracy

        One of the debunks proving we visited the moon being that the astronauts came back with lunar rock that's identical to rock found on earth. Awesome.

        Neil Armstrong's face is another debunk bullet-point, lol.

        Can't work out if the huff is secretly working FOR conspiracists or not.... there's some quality drivel in that post, good for a giggle.

        http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2014/07/18/apollo-11-fake-proof_n_5599372.html

        1. Swarthy
          Alien

          Re: Huff post has a cracking debunk of lunar conspiracy

          The best foil for Lunar Landing Conspiracies is that "If NASA faked the landings, why haven't they done more of them?"

          Oblig. XKCD

          1. Grikath

            Re: Huff post has a cracking debunk of lunar conspiracy

            There's an even simpler one: If the lunar landings were faked, or even fake-able, the USSR would have done the exact same thing, and probably better, given that they were notorious for their quality in manipulating foto's and skill at propaganda. They had the technology, political environment, and manpower to pull a stunt like that, more than the US.

            Yet they didn't bother. Instead they focussed on reliable launch vehicles to put satellites and space stations up (and incidentally ensure their ICBM's would fire, their AA got high enough to intercept...etc.....) , something which they're still making bacon from up to this day.

            1. PassingStrange

              Re: Huff post has a cracking debunk of lunar conspiracy

              What's even more ludicrous is the implication that Hollywood then ignored the goldmine that was the technology supposedly used, and that all of the SFX specialists involved in the "fake" also forgot everything they'd done, and the whole industry went right back to the same old low-tech SFX it had been using for years. You've only got to look at the moon and other "low gravity" scenes in "2001" (released only the year before the landing) to see the limits on what the industry of the time was capable of. But then again, such trivia don't bother crackpots.

    5. cray74

      "Now about doing science experiments on so called moon rock under Planet Earth conditions (gravity,having an atmosphere etc.) is the height of stoopidity. If anything it should be done on the ISS (outside obviously)."

      Putting igneous grains of moon rock in a foreign environment like the micro-gravity, atomic oxygen-contaminated ISS hull would only complicate an analysis of the grains' chemical composition.

      A more constructive environment for such a chemical analysis would be on Earth, where you have a better understanding and control of contaminants in the experimental apparatus and environment. Controlling ultra high vacuums is common practice in Earth labs. Earth also reduces your worry of small experimental samples being ravaged by atomic oxygen - it doesn't take much to start forming a chemically modified layer with atomic oxygen.

      1. John Brown (no body) Silver badge
        Facepalm

        atomic oxygen?

        OMG! That's like nooklear! Radioation and stuff. What's that you say? There's oxygen in the air? Ban it!! We're doomed, DOOMED I tells ya!

        1. Wzrd1 Silver badge

          Re: atomic oxygen?

          Be warned, hydroxic acid, hydrogen monoxide, dihydrogen monoxide, hydrogen oxide, hydric acid, hydrohydroxic acid, hydrol and μ-Oxido dihydrogen are widely traded.

          Dangerous stuff, it can cause death by asphyxiation, circulatory overload and more.

          It's so addictive that once one is exposed to it, one would lose their life if consumption of it is ceased.

      2. Jonathan Richards 1
        Boffin

        O<sub>2</sub>

        Three times, you wrote "atomic oxygen", over-riding my science-pedant restraint circuits, and so I am forced to point out that atomic oxygen is rather rare: one fifth of earth's atmosphere is composed of molecular oxygen, though.

        1. cray74

          Re: O<sub>2</sub>

          Three times, you wrote "atomic oxygen", over-riding my science-pedant restraint circuits, and so I am forced to point out that atomic oxygen is rather rare: one fifth of earth's atmosphere is composed of molecular oxygen, though.

          I was responding to the suggestion that moon rocks should be tested on the International Space Station* and thus used "atomic oxygen" deliberately. At the ISS's altitude, atomic oxygen is a real and present problem for materials selection and design. The Long Duration Exposure Facility had many of its materials seriously degraded by atomic oxygen: silicone rubbers were converted to silica, Kapton was embrittled and degraded into brittle crap, durable solders corroded and flaked apart, and so on. Add the effects of large thermal expansion / contraction, UV light, and particle radiation to atomic oxygen, and LEO is a surprisingly aggressive environment.

          http://esmat.esa.int/publications/published_papers/corrosion_in_space.pdf

          If you want to perform a high-quality chemical analysis of microscopic grains of moon dust, then doing so outside the hull of the ISS is less ideal than in a terrestrial environment. As seen on ISS and LDEF materials, atomic oxygen modifies a thin layer of surface material in a short time (and thicker amounts over, well, long durations). When you're dealing with microscopic grain of moon dust, "thin layer" is similar to "radius of the grain," thus meaning your specimens are ruined. Or at least more challenging to analyze.

          *As suggested earlier in this thread by "Your alien overlord - fear me"

          Darn, that was only 5 uses. Atomic oxygen, atomic oxygen, atomic oxygen, atomic oxygen, atomic oxygen.

    6. ItsNotMe
      FAIL

      "...is the height of stoopidity."

      No...actually @Your alien overlord - fear me...the REAL height of stupidity is not being able to spell words correctly.

      Looks like you are at the head of the class.

  3. Stevie

    Bah!

    Dinosaurs Gassed Into Extinction By Moon In 8 Trillion BC!

    I miss the Weekly World News.

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