Found this story over at
nature.com. Whats your take on this. Do you someday see humans living on the Moon?
Future astronauts who may live on the Moon might need to keep themselves grounded. A team of U.S. scientists has found that the moons surface can become charged with thousands of volts of static electricity.
The charges build up from two causes,passing through the tail of the Earth's magnetic field and solar storms that impact the moon with high energy particles. The charges that build up could be more than enough to knock out computers and electrical equipment.
This charging could release sparks that disable electronic equipment — including monitors, space buggies or even the front door of a Moon base. And it could cause dust clouds that clogs up instruments. What's worse, it can be caused by bad weather in space: just when astronauts need their equipment to give them warning and allow them to shelter from the radiation.
The static charge also causes clouds of fine moon dust to form which can get into systems and foul equipment on it's own. The charges could reach as high as 4,500 volts if concentrated in a small area but might be of little concern if spread out.
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