Future lunar appearance

Joe Dellinger (jdellinger@amoco.com)
Tue, 13 Jan 1998 11:16:28 -0600

	An interesting consequence of the moon acting "like a mirror" is that
even a small amount of human activity (compacting the soil) will result in a
dramatic darkening of that part of the full moon. I predict that future lunar
bases and especially lunar "dirt roads" will be easily visible at full moon
in even small telescopes, after the bases have been up there a few years (so
the area around them gets well beaten down). Long enough lunar "roads" might
even be just detectable to the human eye from Earth. Think of the appearance
of the satellite tethers, but in reverse.