Near side of the Moon Near side of the Moon The near side of the Moon is the lunar hemisphere that is permanently turned towards Earth, whereas the opposite side is the far side. Only one side of the Moon is visible from Earth because the Moon rotates on its axis at the same rate that the Moon orbits the Earth – a situation known as synchronous rotation, or tidal locking. The Moon is directly illuminated by the Sun, and the cyclically varying viewing conditions cause the lunar phases. Sometimes the dark portion of the Moon is faintly visible due to earthshine, which is indirect
Solar eclipses on the Moon portion of the eclipse was rising. Eclipses were more frequent, tens of millions of years later, eclipses became less numerous as the lunar orbit slowly moved away from the Earth. The view of the sun, even its chromosphere was blocked by the Earth. Around some hundreds of millions of years ago, the Earth blocked all of the Sun's chromosphere, totality was slightly longer than the partial portion. At the same time there were more partial eclipses on the Moon. As the Moon recedes about 3 cm each year, eclipse totality length slowly shrinks and the partial portion slowly lengthens. The