# Why did it take 3 days to get to the moon? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [May 27, 2006, 9:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-it-take-3-days-to-get-to-the-moon/358428 "2006-05-27T09:23:15Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 15\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Kinthalis](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kinthalis/32/16084_2.png) [@Kinthalis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kinthalis)\ **Post date:** [July 11, 2012, 6:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-it-take-3-days-to-get-to-the-moon/358428/41 "2012-07-11T18:49:04Z")
Here’s a handy map of the trajectory: [![](http://media.popularmechanics.com/images/apollo-map-large-0609.jpg) ](http://media.popularmechanics.com/images/apollo-map-large-0609.jpg) And here is an interactive web app that shows each stage: [http://spaceflight.nasa.gov/history/apollo/apollo\_mission.html](http://spaceflight.nasa.gov/history/apollo/apollo_mission.html) ---
**Author:** ![Smeghead](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/f1d935/32.png) [@Smeghead](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Smeghead)\ **Post date:** [July 11, 2012, 6:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-it-take-3-days-to-get-to-the-moon/358428/42 "2012-07-11T18:51:45Z")
Yep. This part: > [@bathman78](#): > > and just stop is where it all breaks down. ---
**Author:** ![bathman78](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/c4cdca/32.png) [@bathman78](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bathman78)\ **Post date:** [July 11, 2012, 6:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-it-take-3-days-to-get-to-the-moon/358428/43 "2012-07-11T18:53:41Z")
> [@chorpler](#): > > Remember, anything that starts on the earth is also moving at that same speed. In order to “stop” in space, if I’m correctly understanding what you mean, you’d have to cancel out your existing velocity 67,000 mph velocity. That would be the same thing as boosting yourself up to 67,000 mph with respect to the earth. OK, so a space craft that leaves earths atmosphere going 24,000 mph is actually not moving forward at all (relative to the universe) but 43,000mph in the opposite direction. 24,000mph slower than the earth is pulling the moon. So technically you are waiting for the moon by traveling the same direction as the moon at a slower velocity than the moon. The moon eventually catches up. Does that make sense? This whole topic started as a friendly conversation among some of my friends (none of us being in the scientific field but all with huge imaginations) Thanks for the input ---
**Author:** ![Cliffy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/59ef9b/32.png) [@Cliffy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cliffy)\ **Post date:** [July 11, 2012, 7:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-it-take-3-days-to-get-to-the-moon/358428/44 "2012-07-11T19:04:17Z")
Anybody interested in this stuff should get their hands on the Apollo News Reference (available [here](http://www.hq.nasa.gov/alsj/CSMNewsRef-Boothman.html), apparently, but I didn’t check the link). It was published by NASA to be a comprehensive reference document for the press at the time, and so it’s got basically everything you’d want to know about the Apollo mission and spacecraft, pitched at the level of an educated, interested layman. There’s a Lunar Module News Reference and Saturn V News Reference available on the web as well. –Cliffy ---
**Author:** ![Musicat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/musicat/32/20189_2.png) [@Musicat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Musicat)\ **Post date:** [July 11, 2012, 7:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-it-take-3-days-to-get-to-the-moon/358428/45 "2012-07-11T19:04:37Z")
> [@bathman78](#): > > First thing, I am no physicist or mathematician, so the question that I have may be stupid so please don’t ridicule me for asking. But if the Earth is moving around the sun at 67,000mph (1,608,000 miles per day) and the moon is being pulled through space by the earth at a distance of 240,000 miles, shouldn’t we (NASA, humans, whatever) then be able to go to space and just stop and wait 3 1/2 hours for the moon to get to us? Besides other considerations, if you cancelled the momentum imparted to you from the Earth to “stop” and wait in space, since you are no longer orbiting the Sun, you would begin to fall into it. Waiting for the Moon to come around would be the least of your problems. ---
**Author:** ![AndrewL](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/3d9bf3/32.png) [@AndrewL](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AndrewL)\ **Post date:** [July 11, 2012, 7:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-it-take-3-days-to-get-to-the-moon/358428/46 "2012-07-11T19:09:52Z")
Your problem is that you are assuming a zero rest frame ‘relative to the universe’ that the rocket can suddenly magically stop relative to. There is no such thing. All movement is relative, and there is no preferred frame of reference that can be declared to be not moving relative to the universe. The Earth isn’t pulling the Moon along with it in orbit. The Moon is orbiting the Earth, and the two of them together are orbiting the Sun, which it itself orbiting the center of the galaxy, which is itself moving at some speed relative to other galaxies in the universe. When the Apollo craft fires its third stage engine for trans-lunar injection, it is still in orbit around the earth - just a highly elliptical orbit which will bring it near the Moon, where the Apollo service module engine will be used to put it into an orbit around the Moon. The math works out regardless of whether you consider the Earth, the Sun, or the Moon to be stationary. ---
**Author:** ![tapu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/49beb7/32.png) [@tapu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tapu)\ **Post date:** [July 11, 2012, 7:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-it-take-3-days-to-get-to-the-moon/358428/47 "2012-07-11T19:26:46Z")
Why did it take 3 days to get to the moon? Lot of that pesky construction along the way. ---
**Author:** ![Inigo\_Montoya](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/inigo_montoya/32/124_2.png) [@Inigo\_Montoya](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Inigo_Montoya)\ **Post date:** [July 11, 2012, 7:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-it-take-3-days-to-get-to-the-moon/358428/48 "2012-07-11T19:40:56Z")
Well the construction, and the fact that we never really went to the moon in the first place. D, and of course, R ---
**Author:** ![Drunky\_Smurf](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/drunky_smurf/32/449_2.png) [@Drunky\_Smurf](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Drunky_Smurf)\ **Post date:** [July 11, 2012, 7:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-it-take-3-days-to-get-to-the-moon/358428/49 "2012-07-11T19:54:11Z")
> [@bathman78](#): > > … Upon seeing the resurrector of this thread did anybody else go; “Na na, na na, na na, na na, shampoo, towel” or was that just me? ---
**Author:** ![tapu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/49beb7/32.png) [@tapu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tapu)\ **Post date:** [July 11, 2012, 7:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-it-take-3-days-to-get-to-the-moon/358428/50 "2012-07-11T19:55:39Z")
> [@Inigo\_Montoya](#): > > Well the construction, and the fact that we never really went to the moon in the first place. > > D, and of course, R No, we did. But we drove there, fool. ---
**Author:** ![kanicbird](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/5f8ce5/32.png) [@kanicbird](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kanicbird)\ **Post date:** [July 11, 2012, 8:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-it-take-3-days-to-get-to-the-moon/358428/51 "2012-07-11T20:30:06Z")
You don’t need to obtain escape velocity to escape the gravity of the earth\*, if you had enough time and fuel you could do it at 1mph. Escape velocity is what is needed to be ‘shot’ from the surface with one burst of speed, it does not come into play for continuously powered rockets. \*technically way out in orbit you will need to exceed the escape velocity to escape, but at that point that far out the escape velocity would be only 1mph. ---
**Author:** ![njtt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/ecd19e/32.png) [@njtt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/njtt)\ **Post date:** [July 11, 2012, 8:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-it-take-3-days-to-get-to-the-moon/358428/52 "2012-07-11T20:30:59Z")
“Mouths full of chocolate Covered cream.” ---
**Author:** ![VOW](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/vow/32/3043_2.png) [@VOW](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/VOW)\ **Post date:** [July 11, 2012, 8:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-it-take-3-days-to-get-to-the-moon/358428/53 "2012-07-11T20:40:53Z")
It was arguing over stopping and asking directions that REALLY took up the time! ~VOW ---
**Author:** ![TriPolar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tripolar/32/3008_2.png) [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)\ **Post date:** [July 11, 2012, 8:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-it-take-3-days-to-get-to-the-moon/358428/54 "2012-07-11T20:47:38Z")
**Why did it take 3 days to get to the moon?** Because it’s really far away. ---
**Author:** ![Declan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ecae2f/32.png) [@Declan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Declan)\ **Post date:** [July 12, 2012, 5:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-it-take-3-days-to-get-to-the-moon/358428/55 "2012-07-12T05:32:10Z")
Is this a zombie thread that got re animated Declan [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-it-take-3-days-to-get-to-the-moon/358428.md?page=2)