noon
Seventy hours later , crossing the moon 's orbit , Stewart would fire the forward cannon and the ship would coast around the moon , becoming the temporary satellite of a satellite . `` The rest would be easy , '' said Stewart , `` owing to the lesser gravity of the moon . The cannon would be fired to cushion the fall to the moon as the ship was gradually sucked toward the satellite . `` The moon is airless , waterless and lifeless , days and nights are two weeks long , temperatures range from that of boiling water at noon down perhaps to that of liquid air at midnight . The men of the ship would walk on the moon clad in diving suits . Gravity being only one-sixth that of the earth , a man would carry several hundred pounds of apparatus for providing air and for regulating the temperature . `` To leave the moon the ship would fire her rear cannon and coast back to earth .