Two Moons? What would happen?

Janus

Such an arrangement is not possible. Such a polar orbit would hold its orientation to the fixed stars (minus precession) so at different points of the month it would have a different orientation as seen from Earth.

Janus

Meaning that the moons would separate into their own independent orbits around the Earth.

sophiecentaur

At certain times, the two moons would be at the same 'position' in the sky. Their total effect, however, would be greater than the effect of a single Moon at their centre of mass - the nearer moon would dominate as their separation could be comparable with the distances from the Earth. This would cause higher tides, occasionally, surely than for a single Moon.

greaper

you have also got to take into account the nature of the orbit of the earth and the moon, in which that they both orbit each other especially if you look at it from a tug of war point of view of the sun, earth and the moon effectively they orbit the sun together and effectively form a binary system on their own.

the orbit of two moons around earth could easily destablise depending on their orbit for example the dark side of the moon is mountainous while the near side is fairly flat when compared to it. the far side actually looks more accreted which like numerous articles have been theorising that a smaller moon effectively accreted into the current moon. and you can't expect to have all that material and not have multiple objects form, it is just the fact that the earth is closer to the sun then planets with more moons which means that we are effectively deeper in the suns gravity well then pluto which has 4 moons.

sophiecentaur

hi and welcome.
I think you mean the far side. During the period of the New Moon, the far side is the side that isn't dark. Pink Floyd have a lot to answer for!

Radrook

Interestingly some scientists believe that the earth once had two moons and that our current moon is a result of their collision. The surface differences between the far side and near side of our moon are factors that they claim support this idea. What the effects and dynamics of such a double mooned earth was they don't explain in this article however. Perhaps in a more detailed one they have. It merits a search.

Science and Technology
August 05, 2011
Scientists Think Earth Once Had 2 Moons
Jessica Berman
http://www.voanews.com/english/news/...126841858.html


An article on the possibility of two moons in Earth’s orbit is published in the journal Nature.