67P compared to other comets, asteroids and Earth objects. Even the Death Star. Illustration by Judy Schmidt.
We’ve seen a bunch of pictures comparing Comet 67P/Churyumov–Gerasimenko with all kinds of cities and objects on Earth, but it’s hard to put everything in perspective. Just how big is this thing? How big is it compared to other asteroids and comets we’ve imaged? What about more familiar objects, like the Burj Khalifa and Central Park?
How big is 67P/Churyumov–Gerasimenko compared to the Death Star?!?
Fortunately, our good friend Judy Schmidt@SpaceGeck took it upon herself to clear this all up. She created this wonderful infographic that shows 67/P surrounded by a bunch of other objects in the Solar System with a similar size. There’s Siding Spring, the Mars moon Deimos, 19P/Borrelly, 103P/Hartley, and others.
And then they’re compared to the Burj Khalifa, a blue whale, the Great Pyramid of Giza, and much more.
But most importantly, at the bottom of the image, you can see the slight curvature of a fully operational Death Star. Yeah… those things are pretty big.
Anyway, I highly recommend you check out Judy’s post about the illustration over on Flickr and read her behind the scenes commentary.
And while you’re at it, check out her previous illustration of 100 planetary nebulae in a single image.
The Milky Way over Lake Annette in Jasper National Park, Alberta, a Dark Sky Preserve, on October 24, 2014. Credit and copyright: Alan Dyer/Amazing Sky Photography.
Does it get any more gorgeous than this? What an absolutely beautiful view of the night sky over Lake Annette and Whistler’s Mountain in Jasper National Park.
“I shot this at the Lake Annette Star Party, one of the Dark Sky Festival events, using the Canon 60Da and 10-22mm lens at 10mm f/4 and ISO 3200 for 1 minute, untracked,” said prolific astrophotographer Alan Dyer on Flickr. “Shot October 24, 2014, with fresh snow on Whistler across the lake and valley and on a calm night with still waters reflecting the stars.”
Absolutely spell-binding! Click on the image for larger versions on Flickr, and check out more of Alan’s stunning imagery on his website, Amazing Sky Photography.
#MilkyWayMonday
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Getting stuff into space is complicated and expensive. And what do you do when your fancy space gadget breaks. You print out a new one, of course, with your fancy space 3D printer. It turns out, space exploration is one of the best uses for this technology. Continue reading “Astronomy Cast Ep. 355: Maker Space: 3D Printing Exploration”
Ambition is a collaboration between Platige Image and ESA. Shot on location in Iceland, it is directed by Tomek Bagi?ski and stars Aiden Gillen and Aisling Franciosi. Does Ambition accomplish more in 7 minutes than Gravity did in 90? Consider the abstraction of the Rosetta mission in light of NASA’s ambitions. (Credit: ESA, Illustration- TRR)
NASA has taken on space missions that have taken years to reach their destination; they have more than a dozen ongoing missions throughout the Solar System and have been to comets as well. So why pay any attention to the European Space Agency’s comet mission Rosetta and their new short film, “Ambition”?
‘Ambition’ might accomplish more in 7 minutes than ‘Gravity’ did in 90.
‘Ambition’ is a 7 minute movie created for ESA and Rosetta, shot on location in Iceland, directed by Oscar-winning Tomek Baginski, and stars Aidan Gillen—Littlefinger of ‘Game of Thrones.’ It is an abstraction of the near future where humans have become demigods. An apprentice is working to merge her understanding of existence with her powers to create. And her master steps in to assure she is truly ready to take the next step.
In the reality of today, we struggle to find grounding for the quest and discoveries that make up our lives on a daily basis. Yet, as the Ebola outbreak or the Middle East crisis reminds us, we are far from breaking away. Such events are like the opening scene of ‘Ambition’ when the apprentice’s work explodes in her face.
The ancient Greeks also took great leaps beyond all the surrounding cultures. They imagined themselves as capable of being demigods. Achilles and Heracles were born from their contact with the gods but they remained fallible and mortal.
The Comet Rendezvous and Flyby Mission conceived in one of two Mariner Mark II spacecraft was abandoned by the US Congress. The American led mission would have accomplished the objectives now being completed by the European Rosetta mission. (Photo Credit: NASA)
But consider the abstraction of the Rosetta mission in light of NASA’s ambitions. As an American viewing the European short film, it reminds me that we are not unlike the ancient Greeks. We have seen the heights of our powers and ability to repel and conquer our enemies, and enrich our country. But we stand manifold vulnerable.
In ‘Ambition’ and Rosetta, America can see our European cousins stepping ahead of us. The reality of the Rosetta mission is that a generation ago – 25 years — we had a mission as ambitious called Comet Rendezvous Asteroid Flyby (CRAF). From the minds within NASA and JPL, twin missions were born. They were of the Mariner Mark II spacecraft design for deep space. One was to Saturn and the other – CRAF was to a comet. CRAF was rejected by congress and became an accepted sacrifice by NASA in order to save its twin, the Cassini mission.
The short film ‘Ambition’ and the Rosetta mission is a reminder of what American ambition accomplished in the 60’s – Apollo, and the 70s – the Viking Landers, but then it began to falter in the 80s. The ambition of the Europeans did not lose site of the importance of comets. They are perhaps the ultimate Rosetta stones of our star system. They are unmitigated remnants of what created our planet billions of years ago unlike the asteroids that remained close to the Sun and were altered by its heat and many collisions.
Artist Illustration of the Cassini space probe to Saturn and Titan, a joint NASA, ESA mission. Cassini was the only Mariner Mark II spacecraft completed. (Photo Credit: NASA)
Our cousins picked up a scepter that we dropped and we should take notice that the best that Europe spawned in the last century – the abstract art of Picasso and Stravinsky, rocketry, and jet travel — remains alive today. Europe had the vision to continue a quest to something quite abstract, a comet, while we chose something bigger and more self-evident, Saturn and Titan.
‘Ambition’ shows us the forces at work in and around ESA. They blend the arts with the sciences to bend our minds and force us to imagine what next and why. There have been American epoch films that bend our minds, but yet sometimes it seems we hold back our innate drive to discover and venture out.
NASA recently created a 7 minute film of a harsh reality, the challenge of landing safely on Mars. ESA and Rosetta’s short film reminds us that we are not alone in the quest for knowledge and discovery, both of which set the stage for new growth and invention. America needs to take heed so that we do not wait until we reach the moment when an arrow pierces our heel as with Achilles and we succumb to our challengers.
And if you’re interested in looking back, here’s an archive to all the past Carnivals of Space. If you’ve got a space-related blog, you should really join the carnival. Just email an entry to [email protected], and the next host will link to it. It will help get awareness out there about your writing, help you meet others in the space community – and community is what blogging is all about. And if you really want to help out, sign up to be a host. Send an email to the above address.
Whether its asteroid prospecting, mining interests, or space tourism, a lot of industries are taking aim at space exploration. Some pioneering spirits – such as Elon Musk – even believe humanity’s survival depends on our colonizing onto other planets – such as the Moon and Mars. It’s little surprise then that lunar land peddlers have begun making deals for land on the Moon.
Image of the Oct. 23, 2014 eclipse acquired with the Hinode spacecraft's X-ray telescope. (NASA/JAXA/SAO)
Did you catch the solar eclipse on October 23? If so, you saw the Moon “take a bite” out of the Sun (to various extents, depending on your location) during what was a partial eclipse for viewers on Earth. But for the Hinode (pronunciation alert: that’s “HEE-no-day”) solar observatory satellite, in its Sun-synchronous orbit around Earth at an altitude of 600 km (373 miles), the eclipse was annular – a “ring of fire.”
The image above was captured with Hinode’s X-ray Telescope at the moment of maximum annularity. Want to watch it burn, burn, burn like Hinode did? Check out a video below:
Not to be confused with “annual,” meaning yearly, an annular eclipse occurs when the Moon passes directly in front of the Sun but at such a distance from Earth to not quite manage to fully cover the Sun’s disk. The bright ring of visible Sun around the Moon’s silhouette gives the event its name: annular is from the Latin word anulus, meaning ring.
The next annular eclipse to be visible from Earth will occur on Sept. 1, 2016.
Led by the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA), the Hinode mission is a collaboration between the space agencies of Japan, the United States, the United Kingdom, and Europe, and is now in its eighth year. NASA helped in the development, funding, and assembly of the spacecraft’s three science instruments. Learn more about the mission here.
Everywhere we look on Earth, we find life. Even in the strangest corners of planet. What other places in the Universe might be habitable?
There’s life here on Earth, but what other places could there be life? This could be life that we might recognize, and maybe even life as we don’t understand it.
People always accuse me of being closed minded towards the search for life. Why do I always want there to be an energy source and liquid water? Why am I so hydrocentric? Scientists understand how life works here on Earth. Wherever we find liquid water, we find life: under glaciers, in your armpits, hydrothermal vents, in acidic water, up your nose, etc.
Water acts as a solvent, a place where atoms can be moved around and built into new structures by life forms. It makes sense to search for liquid water as it always seems to have life here. So where could we go searching for liquid water in the rest of the Universe?
Under the surface of Europa, there are deep oceans. They’re warmed by the gravitational interactions of Jupiter tidally flexing the surface of the moon. There could be life huddled around volcanic vents within its ocean. There’s a similar situation in Saturn’s Moon Enceladus, which is spewing out water ice into space; there might be vast reserves of liquid water underneath its surface. You could imagine a habitable moon orbiting a gas giant in another star system, or maybe you can just let George Lucas imagine it for you and fill it with Ewoks.
The white dwarf G29-38 (Image Credit: NASA)
Let’s look further afield. What about dying white dwarf stars? Even though their main sequence days are over, they’re still giving off a lot of energy, and will slowly cool down over the coming billions of years. Brown dwarfs could get in on this action as well. Even though they never had enough mass to ignite solar fusion, they’re still generating heat. This could provide a safe warm place for planets to harbor life.
It gets a little trickier in either of these systems. White and brown dwarfs would have very narrow habitable zones, maybe 1/100th the size of the one in our Solar System. And it might shift too quickly for life to get started or survive for very long. This is our view, what we know life to be with water as a solvent. But astrobiologists have found other liquids that might work well as solvents too.
Artist concept of Methane-Ethane lakes on Titan (Credit: Copyright 2008 Karl Kofoed). Click for larger version.
What about life forms that live in oceans of liquid methane on Titan, or creatures that use silicon or boron instead of carbon. It might just not be science fiction after all. It’s a vast Universe out there, stranger than we can imagine. Astronomers are looking for life wherever makes sense – wherever there’s liquid water. And if they don’t find any there, they’ll start looking places that don’t make sense.
What do you think? When we first find life, what will be its core building block? Silicon? Boron? or something even more exotic?
And if you like what you see, come check out our Patreon page and find out how you can get these videos early while helping us bring you more great content!
Artist concept of the Terrestrial Return Vehicle (TRV). Credit: Intuitive Machines
Getting to the International Space Station is no easy task. Generally speaking, it involves loading up a space capsule with several tons of cargo and then expending millions of liters of fuel to get it into orbit. This process is time consuming and very expensive. And what if astronauts want to send some things back? Currently, their only option for return capability is provided by the same cargo capsules that are sent up to them.
Antares rocket stands erect, reflecting off the calm waters the night before a launch from NASA’s Wallops Flight Facility, VA, on Oct. 28, 2014. Credit: Ken Kremer/kenkremer.com
NASA WALLOPS FLIGHT FACILITY, VA – An Orbital Sciences Corp. commercial Antares rocket was given the GO for its first night launch on Oct. 27, following a launch readiness review on Sunday, Oct. 26, between managers from Orbital Sciences Corp. of Dulles, Virginia, and NASA.
The rocket was rolled to the launch pad and erected. Technicians are putting the final touches on the rocket to prepare it for flight to the International Space Station (ISS).
NASA and Orbital Sciences are targeting Antares for blastoff at 6:45 p.m. EDT on Oct. 27 from beachside Launch Pad 0A at the Mid-Atlantic Regional Spaceport (MARS) at NASA Wallops Island Flight Facility on Virginia’s eastern shore.
There is a 10 minute launch window to get Antares off the ground as the launch pad moves into the plane of the space stations orbit. The slightly longer launch window is due to the extra thrust available from using a new, more powerful ATK built upper stage engine.
Technicians processing Antares rocket on Oct 26 to prepare for first night launch from NASA’s Wallops Flight Facility, VA, on Oct. 27 at 6:45 p.m. Credit: Ken Kremer – kenkremer.com
The rare spectacle of a night launch within view of tens of millions could WOW hordes of US East Coast residents in densely populated areas up and down the Atlantic shoreline – weather permitting.
The current forecast calls for an almost unheard of 98% chance of favorable weather conditions at launch time.
Depending on local weather conditions, the Antares blastoff will be visible along much of the US eastern seaboard – stretching from Maine to South Carolina.
Orbital 3 Launch from NASA Wallops Island, VA on Oct. 27, 2014- Time of First Sighting Map. This map shows the rough time at which you can first expect to see Antares after it is launched on Oct. 27, 2014. It represents the time at which the rocket will reach 5 degrees above the horizon and varies depending on your location . We have selected 5 degrees as it is unlikely that you’ll be able to view the rocket when it is below 5 degrees due to buildings, vegetation, and other terrain features. However, depending on your local conditions the actual time you see the rocket may be earlier or later. As an example, using this map when observing from Washington, DC shows that Antares will reach 5 degrees above the horizon approximately 117 seconds after launch (L + 117 sec). Credit: Orbital Sciences
Antares is carrying Orbital’s privately developed Cygnus pressurized cargo freighter loaded with nearly 5000 pounds (2200 kg) of science experiments, research instruments, crew provisions, spare parts, spacewalk and computer equipment and gear on a critical resupply mission dubbed Orb-3 bound for the International Space Station (ISS).
Orbital Sciences Antares rocket stands erect and ready for blastoff the day before its first night launch from NASA’s Wallops Flight Facility, VA, targeted for Oct. 27 at 6:45 p.m. Credit: Ken Kremer – kenkremer.com
This is the heaviest cargo load yet lofted by a Cygnus. Some 800 pounds additional cargo is loaded on board compared to earlier flights, that’s enabled by using the more powerful ATK CASTOR 30XL second stage for the first time.
Research gear and experiments account for about 1600 pounds (720 kg), or about one third of Cygnus total cargo load.
Among the items aboard are 32 cubesats and deployers, a 6000 psi high pressure replacement nitrogen tank needed for spacewalks from the Quest airlock, experiments enabling the first space-based observations of meteors entering Earth’s atmosphere, determination of how blood flows from the brain to the heart in the absence of gravity, investigations on the impact of space travel on both the human immune system and an individual’s microbiome, the collection of microbes that live in and on the human body, and student science investigations from the SSEP/NCESSE.
“There is nothing more exciting than spaceflight,” said Frank Culbertson, Orbital’s executive vice president of the advanced programs group, at a pre-launch briefing at NASA Wallops.
“It is important to inspire the next generation of scientists. We need to keep the kids inspired to study math and science and keep going back to space. If we stop going to space, it will be very hard to restart.”
On-Ramp to the Orbital Sciences Antares rocket and International Space Station – ready for blastoff the day before its first night launch from NASA’s Wallops Flight Facility, VA, targeted for Oct. 27 at 6:45 p.m. Credit: Ken Kremer – kenkremer.com
This Cygnus resupply module, dubbed “SS Deke Slayton,” honors one of America’s original Mercury 7 astronauts, Donald “Deke” K. Slayton. He flew on the Apollo-Soyuz Test Project mission in 1975 and championed commercial space endeavors after retiring from NASA in 1982. Slayton passed away in 1993.
The Orbital-3, or Orb-3, mission is the third of eight cargo resupply missions to the ISS through 2016 under the NASA Commercial Resupply Services (CRS) contract award valued at $1.9 Billion.
Orbital Sciences is under contract to deliver 20,000 kilograms of research experiments, crew provisions, spare parts and hardware for the eight ISS flight.
NASA Television will broadcast live coverage of the launch, including pre- and post-launch briefings and arrival at the station. Launch coverage begins at 5:45 p.m. EDT.
NASA will broadcast the Antares launch live on NASA TV starting at 5:45 p.m. Monday – http://www.nasa.gov/nasatv
You can also watch the pre- and post launch briefings on Monday on NASA TV.
Of course the absolute best viewing will be locally in the mid-Atlantic region closest to Wallops Island.
Locally at Wallops you’ll get a magnificent view and hear the rockets thunder at the NASA Wallops Visitor Center or other local spots around the Chincoteague National Wildlife Refuge area.
For more information about the Wallops Visitors Center, including directions, see: http://www.nasa.gov/centers/wallops/visitorcenter
Watch here for Ken’s onsite reporting direct from NASA Wallops.
Stay tuned here for Ken’s continuing Earth and Planetary science and human spaceflight news.
