I thought I would share this photo of the Moon rock I saw the National History Museum in London this half term holiday. It is rather a small rock only 128g but it was brought to Earth by the Apollo 16 Astronauts in April 1972.

Now although small I gazed upon the surface and oddly of all the things we saw that day this was the most fantastic and special. I looked up and imagined how far they had gone and all the technology and skills which mankind had used to get there and back. Simply quite fantastic!

Lunar rock differs from terrestrial rock as it lacks the elements lost during heating, such as water, and is rich in elements created at high temperatures. This suggested that the moon had once been heated to very high temperatures.

The lunar rocks were also much older than expected, the oldest being 4.4 billion years old. This is much older than the oldest Earth rocks, which are around 3.8 billion years old. This is because the moon’s volcanoes have stopped spewing new lava to the surface and there is no wind or water to erode the surface, whereas the Earth’s surface is continually changing. Little has changed on the moon’s surface for billions of years.

Also in plain language it really does look like the surface of the moon from which it has came which made my day. I would also add that the rest of the minerals are pretty cool as well!

If you want to look it is in the red zone.