Mind-Blowing Moon Facts To Celebrate The Apollo Anniversary

Along with the launch of NASA's Lunar Prospector on Jan. 6, 1998 the ashes of Eugene Shoemaker came along for the ride and became the first person to be put to rest on the Moon.

Shoemaker was a geologist and astronomer who worked on several U.S. space missions and discovered about 20 comets and 800 asteroids along with his wife. He longed to be an astronaut, but was rejected because of medical problems.

A polycarbonate vial carrying an ounce on Shoemaker's ashes slammed into a moon crater burying him in the place he so badly wanted to go.

According to research particles of Moon dust are so small and jagged that if they get into the lungs it is likely that moon dust would cause airway inflammation, at best.

Researchers think moon dust is even more dangerous and cancerous to humans than regular dust because it has been exposed to the harsh radiation in space.

According to a report by the Lowel Observatory, 13 per cent of people really thought the moon was made of cheese.

Maybe because of the craters they thought it was a huge chunk of Swiss cheese.

Apollo 17 commander Eugene Cernan was so sure humans would continue their lunar travels that he left his camera up there, thinking one day someone would return to the moon, grab the camera, and the glass deteriorated would tell scientists about solar radiation.

Cernan's camera is just one piece of the junk humans have left on the Moon, which weighs about 200 tons. Some of the other junk is just garbage, including astronaut poop, commemorative plaques, and dead lunar rovers, but other remains are actually useful.

NASA uses mirrors left on the moon to measure the distance between the Earth and the Moon.

The moon is actually shaped like an egg with the large end pointed toward Earth.

Luckily Apollo 11 was a success and Nixon never had to read the speech he had prepared if it was a tragic failure. Below is an excerpt from the moving speech, the complete transcript can be read on The Daily.

They will be mourned by their families and friends; they will be mourned by the nation; they will be mourned by the people of the world; they will be mourned by a Mother Earth that dared send two of her sons into the unknown.

In their exploration, they stirred the people of the world to feel as one; in their sacrifice, they bind more tightly the brotherhood of man.

In ancient days, men looked at stars and saw their heroes in the constellations. In modern times, we do much the same, but our heroes are epic men of flesh and blood.

Recent data showed that the American flags are still standing on the moon. One issue? They are probably blank.

The red and blue colours of the Nylon flags that lunar astronauts left on the surface of the Moon 43 years ago have been bleached out by radiation from the sun.

The instruments on an aircraft can be so precise that they can get thrown out of alignment by the Moon's gravity.

Although probably not caused by the Moon, there are also mysterious gravity waves that cause turbulence on clear days.

Blue Moons happens when there are four full moons in a season instead of the usual three. This happens because the lunar cycle doesn't fit perfectly with our calendar.

If you missed the last Blue Moon on August 31, 2012, you won't be able to see on until 2015.

During the cold war era, the U.S. had plans to set off a nuclear bomb on the moon to intimidate the Soviets.

The Moon moves further away from the Earth at the rate of 1.48 inches per year.

If it moves far enough away, full solar eclipses would be impossible and eventually the Earth's orbit could become unstable.

The giant impact of a Mars-sized planet and Earth is what formed the Moon, our only natural satellite.

The impacting planet collided with Earth and the mantles of both planets shot out in the space around the Earth. Over time the debris gathered together, giving us our moon.

NASA found water on the Moon in 2009 and in 2012 they announced that it could be a lot more common than previously thought.

In some areas that are permanently under shadow, there could be up to 2 per cent water frost in the soil.

The space suits worn by the astronauts weighed 180 pounds, but only 30 pounds on the Moon.

Even with their own body weight and pounds of equipment, they still had trouble walking on the Moon because they were so light. The astronauts describe the difficulty of walking saying they had to be careful of where their centre of mass was to make sure their feet were still underneath them.

They ended up having to bunny-walk or horsey dance to get around.

The Apollo mission have successfully sent 12 people to the Moon including:

• Apollo 11 Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin
• Apollo 12 Pete Conrad and Alan Bean
• Apollo 14 Alan B. Shepard and Edgar Mitchell
• Apollo 15 David Scott and James Irwin
• Apollo 16 John Young and Charles Duke
• Apollo 17 Eugene Cernan and Harrison Schmidt

We only see one side of the moon. That's because the gravitational pull of the Earth has slowed down the Moon's rotation so much that it matches our planet's orbit of 29.5 days.

If the moon did not rotate at all we would eventually see the far side.

The famous words everyone heard Neil Armstrong say was, 'That's one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind,' but he actually meant to say 'for a man'.

Armstrong claimed the 'a' had been unheard because of technical difficulties, but after hearing the recording he admitted he forgot to say the 'a.'

Apollo astronauts placed seismometers on the Moon that measure the movements of the ground. The data indicated that there are several types of moonquakes including ones from the impact of meteors, the expansion of ice, and tides from the Earth's gravity pulling on the Moon about 450 miles under the surface.

The gravitational pull of the Moon pulls the water in the oceans toward it. The Moon creates a water bulge on the Earth and is the reason for the tides.

Full moons make the tide even bigger, and the full moon on Oct. 29 contributed to Superstorm Sandy's record-setting storm surge in New York and New Jersey.

Popular myths say the moon makes people crazy, even the word 'lunatic' with 'Luna' meaning moon suggest the moon makes people crazy.

A 1996 study on 150,000 emergency rooms showed that full moons did not mean more craziness, or more hospital visits, which researchers use as evidence proving that the full moon doesn't make people crazy.

The OTHER Mars Rover Is Still Sending Back Awesome Images >