This week, the agency said space organizations around the world are considering how best to keep time on the moon.
A small airplane is silhouetted against the full moon as it rises Sunday, Feb. 5, 2023, in Kansas City, Mo. CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. — With more lunar missions than ever on the horizon, the European Space Agency wants to give the moon its own time zone.
For now, a moon mission runs on the time of the country that is operating the spacecraft. European space officials said an internationally accepted lunar time zone would make it easier for everyone, especially as more countries and even private companies aim for the moon and NASA gets set to send astronauts there.
While the space station doesn’t have its own time zone, it runs on Coordinated Universal Time, or UTC, which is meticulously based on atomic clocks. That helps to split the time difference between NASA and the Canadian Space Agency, and the other partnering space programs in Russia, Japan and Europe.
There are also technical issues to consider. Clocks run faster on the moon than on Earth, gaining about 56 microseconds each day, the space agency said. Further complicating matters, ticking occurs differently on the lunar surface than in lunar orbit.
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