I read recently about an organized hunt for the Apollo 10 LEM named Snoopy which is still in orbit around the sun but apparently had left the Earth/Moon system. This got me thinking about the other missions, after the astronauts left the moon, docked with the command module and jettisoned the LEMs what happened to them? I can think of three possibilities, they crashed back on the moon, they were jettisoned out of the moons orbit or they are still in orbit around the moon. From what I read the least likely seems to be that they are still in orbit, a stable orbit around the moon appears to be difficult to find, too far out and the Earths gravity will destabilize it, too close and the gravitational differences caused by the moons mountainous surface will destabilize it. My money is on them being flung out of the system as Apollo 10's LEM apparently was and I'd never heard about them crashing into the moon.
When you see pictures of the Milky Way in the night sky it looks nothing like the nice picture of a spiral galaxy shown in books when they talk about the Milky Way. I know that if we are in a spiral galaxy we would be seeing it edge on and a lot is said to be obscured by clouds of dust but has it actually been proven that our galaxy is spiral or is this just an assumption? Do we have any clue what lies beyond the Milky Way or does it completely obscure our view of what's on the other side?
Slashdot Mirror
I read recently about an organized hunt for the Apollo 10 LEM named Snoopy which is still in orbit around the sun but apparently had left the Earth/Moon system. This got me thinking about the other missions, after the astronauts left the moon, docked with the command module and jettisoned the LEMs what happened to them? I can think of three possibilities, they crashed back on the moon, they were jettisoned out of the moons orbit or they are still in orbit around the moon. From what I read the least likely seems to be that they are still in orbit, a stable orbit around the moon appears to be difficult to find, too far out and the Earths gravity will destabilize it, too close and the gravitational differences caused by the moons mountainous surface will destabilize it. My money is on them being flung out of the system as Apollo 10's LEM apparently was and I'd never heard about them crashing into the moon.
When you see pictures of the Milky Way in the night sky it looks nothing like the nice picture of a spiral galaxy shown in books when they talk about the Milky Way. I know that if we are in a spiral galaxy we would be seeing it edge on and a lot is said to be obscured by clouds of dust but has it actually been proven that our galaxy is spiral or is this just an assumption? Do we have any clue what lies beyond the Milky Way or does it completely obscure our view of what's on the other side?