Starship Asterisk*

Nightfall
short story - Asimov
novel - Asimov & Silverberg

unexpectedly rewarded by an electrical blackout

Do we know why we had to wait for the release of the many images we got on the 12th, as opposed to them being released as they were 'captured'?

Chris Peterson wrote: ↑Mon Jun 06, 2022 4:15 am Given that to our eyes we only see the central part of Andromeda, and it's about the same brightness as the Milky Way, I'd expect this view to have both components look similar (and to our eyes, faint gray).

Spoilsport.

Tszabeau wrote: ↑Tue Feb 08, 2022 12:30 pm Okay… who lit the astrophotographer’s head?

My first thought was...
Klaatu barada nikto.

johnnydeep wrote: ↑Mon Nov 22, 2021 4:05 pm

Keyman wrote: ↑Mon Nov 22, 2021 4:01 pm Thanks. Figured it wasn't "too" close or we'd have seen it on TMZ. *L*

See the edit in my prior post. It seems to get REALLY close to Venus on Dec 18.

I don't think they have TMZ on Venus.

Thanks. Figured it wasn't "too" close or we'd have seen it on TMZ. *L*

OK, maybe it's just me but...
When they say

passing near both Earth and Venus

shouldn't we include at least an approximation of "near"?

the change in the Sun's apparent diameter between perihelion and aphelion amounts to a little over 3 percent.

So..."super sun"?

Can somebody explain why there will only be 14 transits in the 21st century. Seems to me that every time Mercury goes around the sun that it would be visible against the sun as a backdrop. I cannot envision the geometry that would limit that to only 14 in 100 years. Mercury's orbit doesn't lie on t...

My first impression was... *damn* they are standing too close.

The link at "foreground" goes here - https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/image/1809/M ... ground.jpg
The link at "background" goes here- https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/image/1809/M ... ground.jpg

An extra special holiday bonus for me.
APOD and XKCD hitting on the same topic today.
https://xkcd.com/1919/

And their own follow on disussion:
http://forums.xkcd.com/viewtopic.php?f=7&t=123841

Yeahbut. If you do that it looks like a...hill.

Carole Channing in Hello Dolly

"E Pur Si Muove"

Can someone explain what the writing means? NASA/JHU's APL/SwRI Those are photo credits: NASA, Johns Hopkins University's Applied Physics Laboratory, Southwest Research Institute. Beneath the picture, you'l see links to each. I also have trouble seeing them as dips, not bumps. But if you look and t...

I had recently heard a story of the failure of a solar sailing craft. I think it was a comunications issue. Light Sail A seems like a success. Was there a recent failure of Light Sail craft ? Well, I found an answer to my own question... LightSail Solar Sail Spacecraft Goes Silent Again by Mike Wal...

I had recently heard a story of the failure of a solar sailing craft. I think it was a communications issue. Light Sail A seems like a success. Was there a recent failure of Light Sail craft ? There were a number of "communication issues" with LightSail A. And in reality, it was never in ...

First, as a charter member of the Planetary Society, thanks for acknowledging our privately funded project. We are very proud of what we accomplished. This was a test flight, and there were a lot of things that we learned that will need to be fixed before next April when LightSail B heads up (on a S...

I think we know....

http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/ceres.png

I suppose this isn't something that would have come up in the original mission plans for any of these projects. :wink: In the six weeks that are left before closest approach, does anybody know the odds that the current path is sufficiently...variable...that it might get closer? I don't suppose the o...

I noticed how dusty and dirty she is, and there's obviously no rover-washes in the vicinity, so the question is... how do they keep the lenses clean enough to take these pictures?

I was looking at the Aral Sea as a candidate for this image. For some reason it's been driving me crazy. Thanks for the confirmation. I learned some interesting information as a result of this google earth search: Russia had a biological warfair laboratory at this sight for many years, that was pro...