Category Archives: NASA

Juno at Jupiter-Update

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   The Juno Spacecraft is now fully engaged in making its planned orbits around the outer planet Jupiter. Since arriving and orbital insertion the spacecraft has made 6 orbits around Jupiter sending back amazing images and advancing our knowledge of the planet and its role in the solar system.
   Showing my age but I can remember how excited I was during the Voyager 1 and 2 flybys of the outer planets Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune during the 1980s. It was 40 years ago, Voyager 1 September 5th1977 – Voyager 2 August 20th 1977, when the spacecraft were launched. While both were targeted for a Jupiter and Saturn flyby Voyager 2 eventually had its mission rearranged so that it would fly past all four of the outer giant planets in a mission called the ‘Grand Slam’ or ‘Grand Tour’. The images from those flybys were just as exciting as the images we see from the current Juno mission albeit improved after 40 years of imaging technology advances.
   So Where are the two Voyagers now? Click here to find out.
   Click here to go to the NASA Video web site to see a short video (15 minutes) about the Voyager mission to the outer planets. This is part of a video series I often used in my Planetarium and classroom during the 1990s – so please realize that the graphics and animations, as well as some descriptions and some explanations are not necessarily as ‘advanced’ as things are now. However two of my heroes, Dr. Edward Stone, and Dr. Andrew Ingersoll, are featured making comments about some of the Science and discoveries.
   Below is a well done video compilation of images taken by the Juno Spacecraft. Click here to go to the Vimeo web site for the original video.

   
   
   

Click here to go to the Qué tal in the Current Skies web site for monthly observing information, or here to return to bobs-spaces.

Mars, Phone Home!

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mars-solar-conjunction-above   Thursday July 27th the planet Mars will be at solar conjunction, on the opposite side of the Sun from the Earth. Mars will reappear on the west side of the Sun as a morning planet next month and gradually will become more visible in the morning skies.
    So while Mars is out of sight for observers it is also out of ‘radio sight’ for all of the spacecraft at Mars – either on the surface or in orbit. Between July 22nd to August 1st mission controllers will stop sending messages to the spacecraft at Mars, however the orbiters will continue their science observations and collecting data. The rovers on Mars on the other hand will not rove until after the radio silence period, but will still be able to carry on with some investigations.

   Click here to read more about how NASA prepares for the radio silence.

   
   
   
   

   
   
   

Click here to go to the Qué tal in the Current Skies web site for monthly observing information, or here to return to bobs-spaces.

It’s The Final Countdown or Cassini Spacecraft’s Grand Finale

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   Two months from this posting, September 15th, the Cassini spacecraft will end its mission at the planet Saturn by diving into the planet’s atmosphere and self destruction.
   This animated graphic shows the hourly position of the Cassini spacecraft as it makes a distant flyby of two of Saturn’s smaller moons, Atlas and Janus on July 19th. (the moons and spacecraft have been greatly enlarged to make them visible)
20 Years Ago
   On October 14, 1997, NASA launched Cassini, its largest interplanetary spacecraft, on a nearly seven-year voyage to Saturn. The voyage to Saturn was a two-part mission that included an orbiter and the Huygens probe. The Cassini orbiter was designed to explore Saturn’s system as it looped over, under, and around the planet’s many moons and rings. The Huygens probe was designed and planned for a study of the atmosphere and surface of Saturn’s largest moon, Titan, as well as a parachute-assisted soft landing on the surface. On September 15th the exploration phase of the Cassini mission will end as the spacecraft runs out of fuel and descends into Saturn’s atmosphere. As frictional forces tear the spacecraft apart, instruments on-board will send back data about the planet’s atmosphere.
35 Years Ago
   Typically, little is known about what happens after or before the active part of a mission. We know that the follow-up to a mission is the data analysis, which usually takes many years. What is generally not acknowledged is the lead-up to the official mission, which begins with the launch. The Cassini Mission was first proposed in 1982, 15 years before the actual launch. Several years of planning and coordination between NASA and the European Space Agency followed. By the end of the 1980’s, the mission had been approved and was finally launched in 1997. Thirty-five years will have passed since the inception of the Cassini mission and the demise of the spacecraft when it enters Saturn’s atmosphere.

    Where is Cassini Now?
    Cassini grand finale fact sheet
    Cassini mission
    Cassini mission timeline poster
    Four Days at Saturn video
    Grand finale

   
   
   

Click here to go to the Qué tal in the Current Skies web site for monthly observing information, or here to return to bobs-spaces.

Solar Eclipse of August 21

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   I too have written some information about the solar eclipse, aka “The Great American Eclipse”, of August 21st. It is my attempt to compare two different views of the eclipse. One will be from within the path of totality where I will be, and the other in my hometown of Lee’s Summit Missouri just south of the path of totality by a few miles. As a result residents in Lee’s Summit, unless they drive north, will only see a partial eclipse with 99.986% of the Sun covered.
   So without further ado click here to go to Eclipsed Thoughts.

   
   
   

Click here to go to the Qué tal in the Current Skies web site for monthly observing information, or here to return to bobs-spaces.

Climate Change and Bees

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So why the bee pictures? It’s all about climate change and the significance of these little residents that we share our planet with. A point is that climate change will certainly have an impact on the human population but perhaps even more serious will be the harm it does to Earth inhabitants like the Bee and its important work of pollinating plants.

   Here is an interesting an informative video from NASA about Bees, pollination, and how the Bees are used in a study about climate change effects..

   Keep informed about climate change with these smartphone apps from NASA.

Some of my Bee Pictures:

Remember: Earth is our home, our only home.

   
   
   

Click here to go to the Qué tal in the Current Skies web site for monthly observing information, or here to return to bobs-spaces.

ISS This Morning

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screenshot_20161231-065616
   This morning I braved the chilly temperature and caught the International Space Station as it orbited a little to the north over my space on the surface.

         A great way to start the end of the year!

   This graphic is a screenshot from my cellphone showing the display from ISS Detector, an extremely useful APP for Android and IOS and tablets like my Kindle Fire.
   
   
   

   The track across the sky lasted about 7 minutes. It started in the west and then followed a path between the two ‘Dippers’ passing the Pointer Stars in the Big Dipper on the way toward Polaris, the North Star.

   
   
   Camera Settings: 18 mm; 3.5 sec. F5.6; ISO 1600

   
   
   

Click here to go to the Qué tal in the Current Skies web site for monthly observing information, or here to return to bobs-spaces.

ISS This Evening

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   Despite a temperature of 6oF and standing in a couple of inches of snow it was worth it as Venus and Mars shined brightly over my neighbor’s laser light show and I waited patiently for an ISS orbit over my home this evening. This orbit had the International Space Station rising in the northwest and setting in the southeast in a 6-minute visibility that took it nearly to the zenith with its maximum altitude of 85o above the horizon. It’s orbital track had the ISS pass along one side of the ‘Summer Triangle’, the stars Vega and Deneb. As it nears the zenith the ISS will pass very close to the star Alpheratz, the upper left corner star of the asterism “Square of Pegasus”. Alpheratz is actually a star in the constellation of Andromeda the Princess, but it it is commonly used to complete the ‘Square of Pegasus” asterism.

   Camera settings were 18mm; ISO 800; F6.0; 3.2 sec. Pictures stacked using StarStaX. StarStaX is available as Freeware for Mac OS X, Windows and Linux.

   
   
   

Click here to go to the Qué tal in the Current Skies web site for monthly observing information, or here to return to bobs-spaces.