Starship Asterisk*

Coil_Smoke wrote:

Lord help us...Look at what''s become of our atmosphere. Even back in the sixty's our atmosphere was referred to a invisible or clear. I remember the first Space Shuttle launch. One of the astronauts Said "Damn It's Smokey Up Here!"... Our air has really gotten worse since then. On the next clearest blue sky day, Go out and block the sun with your hand or a building. With(Better) or without sunglasses look at the smokey haze up there around the sun.

http://www.nbcnews.com/id/47435505/#.UV_8PjfYzgc wrote:
Smokey Bear along for the ride to space station
Russians let astronaut choose the toy mascot for mission aboard Soyuz spacecraft

[img3="Circled in red, the Smokey Bear talisman and "zero-g indicator" is seen
near NASA astronaut Joe Acaba on board Soyuz TMA-04M."]http://media3.s-nbcnews.com/j/MSNBC/Com ... id-6x2.jpg[/img3]

By Robert Z. Pearlman, 5/15/2012

<<When a former American schoolteacher, a veteran Russian space station commander, and a rookie Russian cosmonaut launched toward the International Space Station Monday, their fiery blastoff was not without a touch of irony: The trio rode a pillar of flame into orbit while carrying a toy mascot known for promoting fire safety. NASA astronaut Joe Acaba and cosmonauts Gennady Padalka and Sergei Revin launched with Smokey Bear, a toy of the mascot used by the U.S. Forest Service to promote awareness of the dangers of human-started fires. The astronaut and cosmonauts lifted off atop a Russian Soyuz TMA-04M at 11:01 p.m. EDT from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan.

Flying — and floating — above the crewmates' heads was the small Smokey toy, continuing a Russian custom for the crew to select a talisman and "zero-g indicator" to hang from the spacecraft's control panel. The toy began to float once they reached orbit, providing a visual clue that they were weightless and safely in space.

Traditionally, the Soyuz's Russian commander provides the doll, often chosen by a child, but for this flight, the honor was turned over to the American aboard. "Gennady's been very gracious and offered us new fliers the opportunity to fly the talisman," Acaba said. A veteran of a 2009 space shuttle mission to the space station, this was Acaba's first launch on a Russian rocket and his first time serving as a station flight engineer.

Acaba's choice of mascot — Smokey Bear — drew questions in Russia but was very recognizable back in the United States. "It was a gift that was given to me by a friend of mine who works for the U.S. Forest Service," Acaba said during a pre-flight press conference. An avid outdoorsman, Acaba holds degrees in geology and served as an environmental education awareness promoter while in the Peace Corps. "Smokey is a very famous icon in the United States," he said in a reply to a Russian journalist, who asked about the meaning behind Smokey. "He's been around since the 1940s and tries to remind us about what the problems are when you have human-caused fires and tries to remind us to protect the environment as well as we can."

Smokey is the center of the longest running public service campaign in U.S. history, according to a spokesperson for the Ad Council, which created the character in 1944 for the U.S. Forest Service. Smokey is perhaps best known for his catchphrase, "Only you can prevent wildfires."
According to Fisher, this is the first time Smokey Bear has flown in space, although a patch featuring the mascot was lofted with a weather balloon payload to 100,000 feet in May 2011. Smokey will celebrate his birthday in space. The Forest Service mascot turns 68 on Aug. 9.>>

http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/IOTD/view.php?id=7656 wrote:

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November 2006 Smog Event, U.S. Northeast

<<While atmospheric pollution over rapidly developing China, including Beijing, has captured scientific and media attention because of the 2008 Summer Olympics, metropolitan areas in all countries are producers of atmospheric haze. Images of haze over the northeastern United States are shown for November 2006 (upper image) and April 1990 (lower image). The upper image is a southeast-looking view of the Long Island Sound and New Jersey coast, with the lower Hudson River and New York Bay in the area of brightest sunglint. On the far right, gray haze streams out to sea offshore of New Jersey, where it becomes harder to see. In fact, haze covers most of the visible area offshore, partly obscuring the sea surface.

By contrast, clouds look quite different from haze in these astronaut images. Clouds usually have sharp margins and are pure white, as clouds at the bottom of both images show. Industrial haze is grayer and more diffuse, and is typical of the air over the Northeast. Flow lines in the upper image show that winds are transporting the haze in a clockwise fashion—bending south. This motion indicates that a high-pressure system was operating on that day, centered roughly over the coast. High-pressure weather systems are notorious for promoting smog events because they bring clear skies, and sunlight promotes smog formation. High pressure also concentrates polluted air near the ground.

Confidence that the haze is indeed human-made stems from prior research, conducted under similar weather conditions, based on a Space Shuttle photograph taken in April 1990 (lower image). This 1990 view looks northwards up the East Coast, with the Florida Peninsula in the foreground. A mass of haze stretches across the top of the entire view. Weather, visibility, and sulfate-content data showed that the haze was indeed industrial smog haze, rather than cloud. The air mass was transported west to east (left to right in this view) around the north edge of a high-pressure system (indicated by an “H”). It moved offshore for at least 1,500 kilometers (932 miles), reaching the Atlantic islands of Bermuda. The leading edge of the haze is visible far to the south, near the Bahamas—indicating that aerosols from the industrial Northeast flowed clockwise around the high and headed directly back toward the large population centers of Florida. (This image has been enhanced to accentuate the haze slightly.)>>

Psnarf wrote:
In the upper right of the enlarged image, there is a green layer underneath the blue. You can almost make out a thin violet layer above that, much like the top of a rainbow arch. Then again, I'd rather be in Paris.....

http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap130327.html

LocalColor wrote:
I remember the vivid red sunsets after the Mt. St. Helens volcano in the 1980's. More recently the very red sky during forest fires.

Where we live we have long a twilight, the sun goes behind the mountain early, but its still "up" so the light lingers a long time.

ta152h0 wrote:
red sky may be ok, green sky not so good , run ( chemistry of comet Lemon )

http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap130207.html wrote:
The greenish tint comes from the coma's diatomic C₂ gas fluorescing in sunlight.

neufer wrote: http://www.pbs.org/wnet/nature/episodes ... sode/7648/

PBS Nature film, River of No Return.
Central Idaho’s Frank Church – River of No Return Wilderness is the largest contiguous wilderness area in the lower 48 States. Endless rugged mountains, wild rivers, forests and deep canyons define this land — home to numerous species of wildlife, including wolves, who have just returned after 50 years of near absence. A young couple, Isaac and Bjornen Babcock, chose this wilderness for their year-long honeymoon. But what begins as a romantic adventure becomes something much greater for the couple — and a tale of hope and celebration for every life trying to make it in the unforgiving heart of the wilderness. This film premiered April 18, 2012. (Video limited to U.S. & Territories.)

MargaritaMc wrote:I may well buy the DVD version...

geckzilla wrote:I don't know about the rest of the film but that particular excerpt was interesting and insightful.