Moon

Mean diameters at one scale.

Rotation relative to stars

27.32 Earth days

Sunrise to sunrise

29.53 Earth days

Surface gravity

1.622 m/s² 16.5% of Earth’s

Mean distance from Earth

384,400 km Centre to centre

Atmosphere

Extremely tenuous exosphere No substantial air for parachute braking

The gap between these circles has no distance scale. Use Earth–Moon to scale for the orbital separation.

Teaching model, rather than today’s phase. North is up; the illuminated right side represents waxing. Phases are not Earth’s shadow.

The sizes and the gap below share one linear scale.

Separation in Earth diameters

30.17

Radio · one way

1.28 s

Radio · there and back

2.56 s

The range runs from mean perigee to mean apogee reference values. These are not absolute extremes or today’s positions. Radio times use vacuum propagation between centres; a real link also depends on station geometry, relays and operations.