Moons 🌒.

                                        MOON FACTS 

DIAMETER 2,160 miles
AVERAGE DISTANCE FROM EARTH 240,000 miles
AVERAGE SURFACE TEMPERATURE 4°F
PERIOD OF ROTATION (measured in Earth days) 27 days, 4 hours, 43 minutes
SURFACE GRAVITY 0.17 (Earth's surface gravity = 1)
ESTIMATED AGE 4.5 billion years



  MOONS  are natural satellites, celestial bodies that orbit other bodies such as planets or large asteroids that are large enough to have their own gravitational pull. Planets acquire moons in a number of ways. Satellites that orbit close by, near a planet's equatorial plane, and in the same direction-such as Jupiter's moons- were likely created at the same time as the planet.
       Moons in retrograde to a planet appear to have formed separately and been captured by the planet's gravity. Neptune's Triton is one such moon. Moons can also come into being when. large objects collide with planets, chip- ping off matter that becomes an orbiting body: Earth's moon, for example, may have formed this way.
      All the planets and dwarf planets)  except Mercury, Venus, Mars, Ceres, and Makemake have moons. Altogether, our solar system contains at least 146 moons. Until the invention of the telescope, only Earths moon was visible. (Moons seem the most promising places to look for evidence of extra- life-forms A few moons , such as Neptune's Triton and Jupiter's lo, have atmospheres and other notable features. Triton has polar ice caps and geysers; lo has huge volcanic eruptions. Jupiter's moon Europa and Saturn's moon Titan may be the only bodies in the str system apart from Earth to have liquid water.    


FAST FACT Calendar of lunar eclipses: Americas, Asia, Australia, and Pacific, April 4, 2015: Americas, Europe Africa, and Atlantic, September 28, 2015: Asia, Australia, and Pacific, January 31, 2018: Africa, S. Asia, Europe, Australia, and Antarctica, July 27, 2018 Americas, W Europe, W. Africa, Atlantic, and Pacific, January 21, 2019.