Deon Anita Storlie, age 10, of Cloquet, Minnesota, for her question:

Do the astronauts see Earth from the moon?

Next to the sun, the earth is the most outstanding object in the lunar skies. However, it can be seen from only one half of the moon. This is the side that always faces the earth. The opposite side never turns to face us. We never see it and it never sees us. From our side of the moon, the earth looks enormous and a person can watch it turn on its axis. Part of its gem colored surface is in daylight and the rest is blurred by the darkness of night.

As seen from the coon, every 24 hours the scene changes through the phases of new earth, half and three quarter earth to full earth. Something else seems rather odd. If you stay in one spot on the moon, the earth does not rise and set in the lunar skies. If you are in the middle of the golden disc, it stays more or less overhead. If you are nearer to the edge of the side facing us, the earth hangs lower in the lunar skies, closer to the horizon.