1. dotphysics
  2. Moonwalking on the moon

Moonwalking on the moon

By rallain on June 29, 2009.

Slate's Explainer has an answer and question post about moonwalking. Here is one of the very good questions answered there.

Would it be easier to moonwalk on the moon?

The Explainer says "absolutely not" and attributes this to the awkwardness of walking on the moon. The article gives an example of Earthly legs being too powerful as the "astronaut's hop". The explainer also says it is awkward because of the pressurized space suits.

I think the problem is almost entirely the pressurized suits. I believe that the astronauts do their moon-hop because it is difficult to bend their legs in the pressurized suits rather than because the gravitational field is smaller.

Suppose you had a space base on the moon so that you could be on the moon and NOT wear a space suit. In this case, I think moonwalking would be essentially the same as on earth. As I showed on my previous post on moonwalk, the move has a lot to do with center of mass and the ratio of the normal forces on the two feet.

On the moon, the ratio of the two forces would still be the same as on Earth. I could be wrong. The only way to know for sure is to build a moon base so that we can test this out. Well, I guess someone could go up in the vomit comet while they are simulating moon gravity.

Tags
forces
free body diagram
friction
momentum principle
Physics
torque
acceleration
moon walk
moonwalk

More like this

WALL-E Gravity and Air
I finally saw the movie WALL-E. Good flick, I liked it. There was, however, one part I must comment on. You know I can't help myself. I feel like the shark Bruce in Finding Nemo. I try not to attack, but there is a tiny drop of blood in the water. Here is the scene that I want to talk about:…
Tides. Why are they so hard?
Every introductory astronomy text and most intro physics texts talk about tides. The usual explanation is something along the lines of: The moon exerts a gravitational force on the Earth and all the stuff on the Earth. This force decreases with distance (1/r2). Thus the moon pulls greater on one…
Gravity, Weightlessness, and Apparent Weight
In my classes, I like to bring up the question: *Why do astronauts float around in space?* The most common response to this question is that they float around because there is no gravity in space. Some people take this a small step further and say that there is no gravity in space because there is…
Cobra Commander & Blowing Up the Moon!
This wonderful headline showed up in my Facebook feed: U.S. 'planned to blow up Moon' with nuke during Cold War era to show Soviets might. This was a bit eyebrow-raising. Dr. Strangelove was a slightly unfair caricature, but the Cold War really did have a better-than-average share of nuttiness.…