Space and astronomy news
Greetings, fellow SkyWatchers! As the Moon slowly leaves the scene the observing heats up as we take a look at some of the Summer’s finest objects as we tour star clusters and nebula. Get out those telescopes and binoculars, because…
Here’s what’s up!
Continue reading “What’s Up this Week: July 17 – July 23, 2006”
This image captured by ESA’s Mars Express spacecraft shows the Iani Chaos region on Mars, east of Valles Marineris. The region is dominated by large, heavily weathered mesas (flattened hills). On the left side of the image, these mesas are about 1 km tall and are up to 8 km wide. The terrain might have been formed by the collapse of the ground after subsurface water or ice was removed.
Continue reading “Iani Chaos on Mars”
In this photograph, Saturn’s moon Titan is partly obscured by smaller moon Rhea. The difference between the moons’ atmosphere is quite pronounced, as Titan has a thick smoggy atmosphere, while Rhea is airless. Cassini took this photograph on June 11, 2006 when it was approximately 3.6 million kilometers (2.2 million miles) from Rhea.
Continue reading “Rhea Obscures Titan”
Discovery and its crew are safely back on the ground after a 13-day trip into space to visit the International Space Station. The shuttle detached from the station on Sunday, and then landed Monday morning in Florida at 1414 GMT (9:14 am EDT). After landing, the astronauts performed the traditional shuttle walkaround, and found the spacecraft surprisingly undamaged after its trip to space and back. The space shuttle Atlantis will be moved to the launch pad in early August to prepare for its upcoming mission to deliver a truss to the station.
Continue reading “Discovery’s Safely on the Ground”
This Cassini image shows Saturn’s shadowy side, its rings, and two of its moons: Mimas and Enceladus. Mimas is on the left, and shows its dark side, while Enceladus is on the far side of the rings, closer to Saturn, and is illuminated by the reflected sunlight from Saturn’s bright side. Cassini took this photo on June 11, 2006 when it was 3.9 million kilometers (2.5 million miles) from Mimas.
Continue reading “One Moon in Light, One in Dark”
After its brief breakdown last month, the Hubble Space Telescope’s main camera is gathering science data again. The Advanced Camera for Surveys stopped functioning after power supply problems, but engineers were able to switch to a backup power system and get it back online. This image was one of the first taken after the camera resumed operations on July 4th. It shows a galaxy cluster located 9 billion light-years away. Hubble located a supernova in June 2006, and then returned to see its afterglow in July.
Continue reading “First Pictures After Hubble’s Breakdown”
After eight days in space, and three spacewalks, the crew of the space shuttle Discovery will be taking the day off. Yesterday’s spacewalk went well, with Mission Specialists Piers Sellers and Mike Fossum testing out methods of repairing damaged shuttle heat shields. During the mission, Sellers lost one of the caulking spatulas used to spread on the repair compound – it flew out of Discovery’s payload bay area and was lost in space.
Continue reading “A Day of Rest for the Astronauts”
Robert Bigelow’s dream of a thriving space tourism industry took a significant step forward today with the launch of the Genesis 1 experimental spacecraft. Bigelow Aerospace reported that the prototype habitat was successfully lofted into orbit atop a converted Russian inter-continental ballistic missile. Once in orbit, it extended its solar panels and began to inflate. The rocket launched at 6:53 pm Moscow Time, and the company released a series of statements over the course of the day reporting that everything’s going well.
Continue reading “Inflatable Habitat Reaches Orbit”
Astronauts Piers Sellers and Mike Fossum wrapped up the third and final spacewalk for space shuttle mission STS-121. During the 7-hour, 11-minute spacewalk, they demonstrated techniques for repairing the shuttle’s heat shield if it was damaged during launch. The mock repairs were made using a special “space caulk gun” and several spatulas to spread on the caulking materials. Discovery will detach from the station on Saturday to return to Earth.
Continue reading “Astronauts Wrap Up Third Spacewalk”
ESA’s Venus Express spacecraft concluded its in-orbit commissioning phase last week, and the agency has declared it ready to enter the operational phase of its science mission. All of its instruments are performing well, except for the Planetary Fourier Spectrometer (PFS), which has a malfunction. The mirror used to target the instrument is locked in the “close” position, preventing the instrument from being able to gather data.
Continue reading “Science Updates from Venus Express”