Dear MEL Topic Readers,
White House wants Moon to have its own time zone
Does a clock brought from the Earth to the Moon work accurately there?
Not exactly. Since the gravity on the Moon is slightly weaker, the time on the
moon moves slightly faster than on the Earth by nearly 60 microseconds every day.
So, if you put an atomic clock on the Moon, it will tick faster than the ones
on Earth. This could cause a catastrophic problem when absolute precision is
required for coordinating activities, such as spacecraft docking on or above
the Moon or data transfer at a specific time to and from the Earth. Recently, NASA,
the US space agency, was directed to work with other government agencies to
develop a lunar-based time system, called Coordinated Lunar Time (LTC) before
the agency’s scheduled manned landing mission on the Moon in 2026. Since a number
of national and private missions to the Moon are also planned, it is essential
to coordinate time between the Moon, spacecraft, and the Earth. But will there
be only one timezone on the Moon?
Read the article and learn about time the new time zone for the Moon.
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