Moon Keeps Far From Earth, Effects and Causes Revealed

Jakarta, CNN Indonesia —

The moon slowly continues to move away from Earth. At the time of its formation, the Moon was only 22,500 km from Earth, but now it is 402,336 km.

The movement of the Moon that continues to move away from Earth is believed to be bringing havoc to Earth’s inhabitants. However, this will happen billions of years in the future.

British astronomer Edmond Halley first suspected the Moon is currently moving away from Earth nearly 300 years ago, after studying ancient eclipse records.

Suspicions were finally confirmed in the 1970s, when experiments were made by firing laser beams at mirrors mounted on the Moon by US and Soviet missions. As a result, the Moon is indeed moving away from Earth at a speed of 3.8 centimeters per year. The movement of the Moon away from Earth is thought to have occurred since 1.5 billion years ago.

Cause the Moon is far away

The distance between the Earth and the Moon occurs due to the imbalance of the centrifugal and centripetal forces of the Moon and Earth. Centripetal force is the apparent motion of a rotating object and seems to pull the object to the center of rotation.

While the apparent centrifugal force seems to throw objects away from the center of rotation. A simple analogy is like a child riding a merry-go-round. The faster the rotation, the stronger the momentum of the impulse as if it will be ejected out of the merry-go-round.

Due to the greater centrifugal force of the Moon on the Earth, the Moon moves away from the Earth. The current distance between the Earth and the Moon is 402,336 kilometers, this is 17 times farther than the initial distance.

Proof of the moon away

We can see some evidence of a slowdown in the fossil record of some creatures. By looking at the daily growth of corals for example, we can calculate the number of days that occurred per year in the past period. From that we can see that the days are getting longer by 19 hours added every 4.5 billion years, according to the report Science Focus.

Moon effect away from Earth

1. Earth’s rotation slows down

The moon is now continuously rotating away from Earth at a speed of 3.78 centimeters per year. This is almost similar to the growth rate of a human fingernail.

Although 3.78 centimeters doesn’t seem like much, in the long term it can affect life on Earth, making the planet slow down.

When the early Earth was formed, the Earth rotated 5 hours per day. But with the moon operating for the last 4.5 billion years, the day has slowed down to the 24 hours we know today, and will continue to slow down in the future.