What makes the moon shine?

The Moon is by far the brightest object on the night sky, but it has no light of its own. Moonlight is simply the reflected light of the Sun. Parts of the Moon that are not in sunlight are invisible against the deep blackness of space. Although the Moon appears bright and silvery, only a small on it from the sun is reflected back towards us. This is because the Moon's surface is grey and rocky, and does not reflect light well. When the Sun is off to one side, part of the Moon is in deep shadow and all we can see is a thin slice, or crescent, of the Moon's lit surface. The far side of the Moon was a mystery until 1959, when a Soviet space probe took the first photographs of it. The actual appearance of the far side was something of a disappoint-ment, because it had far fewer craters than the familiar side that always faces Earth.

Fact file

!A solar eclipse can only happen when the Earth, the Moon and the Sun are all aligned. These eclipses may be total or partial depending on the exact alignment of the three bodies.