Astronomy, cosmology and space thread

Discussion on science, nature and technology across the globe.
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Re: Astronomy, cosmology and space thread

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Countdown for NASA’s return to crewed space missions

http://www.flightsafetyaustralia.com/20 ... -missions/


NASA is getting back into human spaceflight. The US space agency will name the astronauts assigned to the first flight tests and missions of Boeing’s CST-100 Starliner and SpaceX’s Crew Dragon next Friday 3 August.

The Starliner and Crew Dragon are part of NASA’s Commercial Crew Program to develop and operate a new generation of spacecraft and launcher to carry crews safely to and from low-Earth orbit. They will be the first launches of American astronauts on American-made spacecraft from American soil to the International Space Station (ISS) since NASA retired the Space Shuttle in 2011.

The Boeing Starliner spacecraft is launched from a United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket and the Crew Dragon launches from a Falcon 9 rocket.

NASA says experiments and a presence on the space station are critical for understanding the challenges of long-duration spaceflight, and necessary for a sustainable presence on the Moon and missions to Mars.

For those who like to stay up late (surely a reasonable assumption about astronomy and space enthusiasts) the announcement will be shown at 11 am US eastern time on the agency’s website, or 1 am on Saturday 4 August Australian eastern standard time.

CASA currently has jurisdiction over airspace from ground level to 100 km altitude, where space is accepted to begin. Until recently, little happened in the upper 80 km of this jurisdiction, CASA executive manager stakeholder engagement, Rob Walker, told the Aerospace Futures conference in Canberra last week.

‘The development of commercial space launches means this is about to change and even before the establishment of the Australian Space Agency on 1 July we were talking with the Department of Industry, Innovation and Science about how we would share the administration of this airspace,’ Mr Walker said.
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Re: Astronomy, cosmology and space thread

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PeteC wrote: Fri Jun 22, 2018 1:07 pm No telescope needed to see Saturn on June 27
Saturn, with its remarkable rings, will be visible to the naked eye on June 27 and astronomers are urging people to have a look.
The gas giant will be at its closest point to Earth this year and in opposition to the Sun, with Earth squarely in the middle, affording the best possible views throughout that night.
National Astronomical Research Institute of Thailand director Saran Poshyachinda said Saturn will be 1.353 million kilometres from Earth, as close as it gets this year, and if the sky isn’t overcast, the planet and its rings will be clearly visible. http://www.nationmultimedia.com/detail/ ... l/30348359
Super-eclipse just hours away

https://www.bangkokpost.com/news/genera ... recent_box

Thai stargazers will be staying up into the wee hours of Saturday to witness the longest lunar eclipse of the 21st century, as a “super blood moon” dazzles the world.

The total eclipse will last 1 hour, 42 minutes and 57 seconds, though a partial eclipse precedes and follows, meaning the moon will spend a total of 3 hours and 54 minutes in the earth's umbral shadow, according to Nasa.

In Thailand, the total eclipse will be visible from 2:30am to 4:13am local time on July 28.
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Re: Astronomy, cosmology and space thread

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Astronomers In Canada Are Baffled By Mysterious Fast Burst Radio Signals Coming From Outer Space.

A baffling and mysterious radio signal has been spotted by a telescope in Canada, and it’s one of the lowest in frequency to date.......

https://www.sciencealert.com/astronomer ... from-space
Last edited by PeteC on Sat Aug 11, 2018 2:33 am, edited 1 time in total.
Reason: Add a proper link and take out the religious conotations
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Re: Astronomy, cosmology and space thread

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Perseids Meteor Shower 2018 ... Aug 12–13, 2018

https://www.timeanddate.com/astronomy/m ... rseid.html
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Re: Astronomy, cosmology and space thread

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Is Southeast Asia the New Bastion for Space Technology?
Space technology is being developed and having rapid progress for liftoff in Southeast Asia
https://videos.inc-asean.com/is-southea ... -for-space
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Re: Astronomy, cosmology and space thread

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Some excitement this morning Russia time. :shock:

Astronauts escape malfunctioning Soyuz rocket

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-45822845


A capsule carrying the two crew members of a Russian Soyuz rocket that malfunctioned on lift-off has landed safely in Kazakhstan.

Russian Cosmonaut Alexey Ovchinin and US astronaut Nick Hague are reported to be "in good condition", both Nasa and Russian media said.

Search and rescue teams are now en route to the landing site.

The rocket had taken off for the International Space Station (ISS) when it suffered a problem with its booster.

The crew had to return in "ballistic descent mode", Nasa tweeted, which it explained was "a sharper angle of landing compared to normal".

The Soyuz rocket had taken off at 04:40 Eastern time for a four-orbit, six-hour journey to the ISS.

Mr Hague and Mr Ovchinin were due to spend six months on the station working on a number of scientific experiments.

Analysis: An uncomfortable ride back to Earth
By Jonathan Amos, BBC science correspondent


Soyuz is one of the oldest rocket designs but also one of the safest. The malfunction appeared to occur around what is termed "staging", where the ascending vehicle goes through the process of discarding its empty fuel segments.

The onboard astronauts were certainly aware that something was not right because they reported feeling weightless when they should have felt pushed back in their seats. The escape systems are tested and ready for exactly this sort of eventuality. It would have been an uncomfortable ride back to Earth, however. The crew would have experienced very high gravitational forces.

There is already much discussion about the current state of Russian industry and its ability to maintain the standards of yesteryear. Whatever the outcome of the inquiry, this event will only heighten those concerns and will lead the US in particular to redouble its effort to bring online new rocket systems, which have been in development. These vehicles are set to make their debut next year.
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Re: Astronomy, cosmology and space thread

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Nasa countdown to landing of Mars quake-sensor, InSight

https://www.bangkokpost.com/news/world/ ... recent_box

TAMPA - Nasa is counting down to a nail-biting touchdown Monday of the $993 million Mars InSight, the first spacecraft to listen for quakes and study the inner workings of another rocky planet.

No one is on board the spacecraft, which launched nearly seven months ago and has traveled some 482 million kilometres.

But part of its mission is to inform efforts to one day send human explorers to the Red Planet, which Nasa hopes to do by the 2030s.
The lander is the first to reach Mars since 2012, when Nasa's Curiosity rover touched down to scour the surface and analyze rocks for signs that life forms may once have inhabited Earth's neighbour, now a frigid and dry planet.

InSight must survive tense entry into Mars' atmosphere, traveling at a speed of 19,800 kilometres per hour and swiftly slowing to 8kph.
This entry, descent and landing phase begins at 11.47am in California (2.47pm Tuesday Bangkok) -- and is only half-jokingly referred to at Nasa as "Six and a Half Minutes of Terror."

Of 43 missions launched toward Mars, only 18 have made it intact -- a success rate of around 40%. All those that made it came from the United States.

"Going to Mars is really, really hard," said Thomas Zurbuchen, associate administrator for the Nasa science mission directorate.
"The exciting part is we are building on the success of the best team that has ever landed on this planet, which is the Nasa team with its contractors and its collaborators."

- French seismometer -

The name InSight is derived from "Interior Exploration using Seismic Investigations, Geodesy and Heat Transport."
The spacecraft itself stands about waist high, at one metre, and once its solar arrays are deployed they will span about 6 metres.

Fully fueled, InSight weighs more than 360 kg, about the same as a Harley Davidson motorcycle.
Its central instrument is a quake-sensing seismometer that was made by the French Space Agency (CNES).
"This is the only Nasa mission until now which is conceived around a foreign-made instrument," Jean-Yves Le Gall, president of CNES, told AFP.

"So it's a mission that is fundamentally for the United States, for France and for improving our understanding of Mars."
The six quake sensors on board are so sensitive they should reveal the smallest tremors on Mars, such as the faint pull of its moon Phobos, impacts from meteors, and possibly evidence of volcanic activity.

Seismology has taught humanity much about the formation of Earth some 4.5 billion years ago, but much of the Earth-based evidence has been lost to the recycling of the crust, driven by plate tectonics. This process does not exist on Mars.

The spacecraft also has a self-hammering probe that can burrow as deep as 3-5 metres, offering the first precise measurement of below-ground temperatures on Mars and how much heat escapes from its interior.

- Landing conditions -

InSight was built by Lockheed Martin, and is modeled after the Phoenix spacecraft that landed near the Martian north pole in 2008.

Like Phoenix, InSight's arrival will be aided by a parachute. Its heat shield will help slow down the spacecraft and protect against the hot friction of entering Mars' atmosphere.

Its landing site is flat area called Elysium Planitia, which Nasa has called "the biggest parking lot on Mars."
The lander must set itself down upright. And then, another critical step is for the solar arrays to deploy, since the lander's one-year mission will be fully solar-powered.

Nasa should know within minutes if the landing went well or not, but will have to wait more than five hours for confirmation of the solar array deployment, due to the orbit pattern of the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter and Mars Odyssey which can communicate InSight's status back to Earth.

That first confirming ping at 2004 GMT on Monday (3am Bangkok) is eagerly awaited by the crew at mission control at Nasa's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California.

"I do have a lot of blood sweat and tears invested in this, and I am looking forward to a nice, safe touchdown on Monday," said Stu Spath, InSight program manager at Lockheed Martin.
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Re: Astronomy, cosmology and space thread

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"Hope is a good thing, maybe the best of things" - Yma o Hyd.
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Re: Astronomy, cosmology and space thread

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NASA releases eerie photo after Mars landing following 'seven minutes of terror'

https://au.news.yahoo.com/nasa-releases ... 58998.html

A NASA spacecraft designed to burrow beneath the surface of Mars landed on the red planet on Monday after a six-month, 482 million-kilometre journey and a perilous, seven-minute descent through the rose-hued atmosphere.

After waiting in white-knuckle suspense for confirmation to arrive from space, flight controllers at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California leaped out of their seats and erupted in screams, applause and laughter as the news came in that the three-legged InSight spacecraft had successfully touched down.

But it was the final “seven minutes of terror” that had NASA staff sitting on the edge of their seats.
“There’s a reason engineers call landing on Mars ‘seven minutes of terror’,” InSight landing team leader Rob Grover said.
“We can’t joystick the landing, so we have to rely on the commands we pre-program into the spacecraft. We’ve spent years testing our plans, learning from other Mars landings and studying all the conditions Mars can throw at us.”

A pair of mini satellites trailing InSight since their May lift-off provided practically real-time updates of the spacecraft’s supersonic descent through the reddish skies. The satellite also shot back a quick photo from Mars’ surface.

The image was marred by specks of debris on the camera cover. But the quick look at the vista showed a flat surface with few if any rocks — just what scientists were hoping for. Much better pictures will arrive in the hours and days ahead.

Wild celebrations at NASA’s Pasadena lab

“What a relief, this is really fantastic…. wow, this never gets old,” Mr Manning said.
People hugged, shook hands, exchanged high-fives, pumped their fists, wiped away tears and danced in the aisles.
“Flawless, this is what we really hoped and imagined in our mind’s eye,” JPL’s chief engineer, Rob Manning declared.
“Sometimes things work out in your favour.”

InSight, a US $1 billion international venture, reached the surface after going from 19,800 kph to zero in six minutes flat, using a parachute and braking engines. Radio signals confirming the landing took more than eight minutes to cross the nearly 160 million km between Mars and Earth.

Viewings were held coast to coast at museums, planetariums and libraries, as well as New York’s Times Square.
NASA last landed on Mars in 2012 with the Curiosity rover.

“Landing on Mars is one of the hardest single jobs that people have to do in planetary exploration,” InSight’s lead scientist Bruce Banerdt said before Monday’s success. “It’s such a difficult thing, it’s such a dangerous thing that there’s always a fairly uncomfortably large chance that something could go wrong.”

Mars has been the graveyard for a multitude of space missions. Up to now, the success rate at the red planet was only 40 percent, counting every attempted flyby, orbital flight and landing by the US, Russia and other countries since 1960.

The US, however, has pulled off seven successful Mars landings in the past four decades, not counting InSight, with only one failed touchdown. No other country has managed to set and operate a spacecraft on the dusty surface.
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Re: Astronomy, cosmology and space thread

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When the manned flights go to Mars, I hope they take along a rover that can to a long distance
and be used to go to some of those failed sites to gather wiring and other things that can be
used to build and expand their housing projects. Cleaning up that planet after their arrival should
be of a fairly high priority. Since the first flight or two may be one way trips, the people there will
have nothing but time on their hands after arrival, anyway. Aren't I just the optimistic one.
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Re: Astronomy, cosmology and space thread

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Probably have to be someplace away from background lighting to see this:
…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………
Shoot for the stars: Geminids meteor shower visible from Thailand tonight

The bright speedy trail of the meteors across the atmosphere produces a spectacle we recognize as shooting stars, according to science website Spacedex.

The waxing moon and clear skies will provide ideal settings for viewing the shower, which NASA says should produce 100 shooting stars each hour. White will be the main color, but stargazers may be able to spot yellow, blue, green and red too.

While most meteor showers come from comet debris, the Geminds are the debris of an asteroid called 3200 Phaethon. Because of this, it can penetrate deeper into Earth’s atmosphere than most other meteor showers, creating beautiful long arcs viewable for 1-2 seconds, according to NASA.

No binoculars or telescopes are needed as this will restrict your view and make it more likely for you to miss a shooting star – just get outside, try to get away from bright artificial lights and enjoy the show.

The star show should start around 8.30pm tonight and last until dawn tomorrow morning, according to the National Astronomical Research Institute of Thailand.

https://coconuts.co/bangkok/news/shoot- ... d-tonight/

https://www.timeanddate.com/astronomy/m ... inids.html

https://au.news.yahoo.com/see-tonights- ... 52001.html
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Re: Astronomy, cosmology and space thread

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Re: Astronomy, cosmology and space thread

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In the UK, we always considered that the winter solstice was the 21st December, not that it makes a lot of difference - wiki seems to give both dates as a possibility https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Winter_solstice
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I've no idea, but a good friend of mine, who is a Druid Priest says it is today due the Solstice point being 6.5 hours after sunset yesterday in the UK.
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Re: Astronomy, cosmology and space thread

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Big Boy wrote: Sat Dec 22, 2018 10:43 am I've no idea, but a good friend of mine, who is a Druid Priest says it is today due the Solstice point being 6.5 hours after sunset yesterday in the UK.
By the sound of it then, it depends on what country you live in but on your basis above, it would definitely be the 22nd in Thailand.
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