Talk:Cordelia (moon)
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According to The Royal Shakespeare Company, this is pronounced [kor-DEE-lee-uh].
Decaying
From the article:
- Cordelia's orbit is within Uranus' synchronous orbit radius, and is therefore slowly decaying due to tidal forces.
Does this mean that the Cordelia's orbit is decaying, or is this actually supposed to refer to Cordelia itself? -- Schnee 01:02, 26 Oct 2004 (UTC)
- I think it's referring to Cordelia's orbit. When a moon is inside the synchronous orbit radius, it's moving faster than the tidal bulge its gravity raises on the surface of the planet it's orbiting so it's always a little bit ahead of it. The gravity of the bulge's mass pulls "back" on the moon, dropping it into a lower orbit. That's how I understand the situation, anyway. Bryan 04:29, 26 Oct 2004 (UTC)
- Pretty obvious, I would say. The subject of the sentence is "Cordelia's orbit", isn't it? As for the mechanics, don't forget the other bulge --which tends to speed up the satellite, but whose influence is lesser because its on the other side of the primary.
- Urhixidur 03:55, 2004 Oct 28 (UTC)
- Heh. I was just going to mention that I'd added discussion of this to Orbit#Orbital decay and ask you to take a look, but I see you've already cleaned it up. Thanks. :) Bryan 05:39, 28 Oct 2004 (UTC)