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Space and Astronomy Thread
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tiger2000
20-12-2010
A unique event (at least in our lifetimes) occurs tomorrow morning with a total lunar eclipse falling on the Winter Solstice.

The first time this has happened for almost 400 years and will not happen again for almost another 400 years. It is also one of the few times during an eclipse that both the sun and the moon are above the horizon during the event.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/20...inter-solstice

http://www.satnews.com/cgi-bin/story...mber=327420408
xxtimbo
20-12-2010
Should nt we give up the idea of a man on Mars ?
Its been 30 plus years since the last man on the moon and America dont look in the mood to repeat the journey any time soon.
Isn't the idea of a manned voyage to Mars really absurd ?
TelevisionUser
20-12-2010
Originally Posted by xxtimbo:
“Should nt we give up the idea of a man on Mars ?
Its been 30 plus years since the last man on the moon and America dont look in the mood to repeat the journey any time soon.
Isn't the idea of a manned voyage to Mars really absurd ?”

Nope, xxtimbo, because in his The Case for Mars book here http://www.bookdepository.co.uk/book...-Case-for-Mars, Robert Zubrin, an American aerospace engineer, set out the case for relatively cheap missions to Mars costing about $5 billion a mission and using existing technology.

That sounds a lot but in terms of the American budget it's nothing. For example, the Americans spent $500 billion plus on the Iraq War and the British spent £10 billion/$15 billion so the USA could have easily funded over 100 crewed missions to Mars and back and the UK alone could have funded 3 such missions. As you can see, it's also about political will and priorities.

In any event, Robert Zubrin's book is an excellent read and l highly recommend it.
HenryGarten
20-12-2010
Isn't there a total eclipse of the moon in the morning?
Dave5158
20-12-2010
Originally Posted by HenryGarten:
“Isn't there a total eclipse of the moon in the morning?”

That's what the post at the top of this page mentions.
xxtimbo
20-12-2010
America is in a bit of a down right now, many people feel they are living in the beginnings of a Big Brother state.

Ive often thought that a new landing on the moon... hoisting the stars and stripes etc, would raise morale and also restore American prestige in the world.
But there aint any signs of a moon mission
so dont hold your breath about a mars mission.

However, thinking back to Europe's mars probe a few years back, that ended in zilch .... I remember very shortly after America landed 2 probes on mars and sent back stunning photos.... so technologically I think theyve still got it !
HenryGarten
21-12-2010
Originally Posted by tiger2000:
“A unique event (at least in our lifetimes) occurs tomorrow morning with a total lunar eclipse falling on the Winter Solstice.

The first time this has happened for almost 400 years and will not happen again for almost another 400 years. It is also one of the few times during an eclipse that both the sun and the moon are above the horizon during the event.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/20...inter-solstice

http://www.satnews.com/cgi-bin/story...mber=327420408”

That Guardian story says that this last happened in 1638. No doubt there was a lunar eclipse on 21st December 1638. However in the 1638 the winter solstice was on or about 11th December. That is why we took 11 days out of the calendar in 1752.

So I wonder if anyone has checked when a lunar eclipse really took place on the winter solstice. I suspect not.
atg
24-12-2010
Of course as the solstice was 23:38 GMT, the solstice in Europe and beyond was on the 22nd, so they still have to wait for this.
irishguy
26-12-2010
apologies if this has been posted already but it is very cool. the distances involved are totally inconceivable

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=17jymDn0W6U
Tissy
29-12-2010
Imagine how delighted I was to be given a huge present on Xmas day - my first ever telescope together with a couple of books on astronomy

Looks complicated to set up but I`m sure I`ll get endless hours of pleasure out of it.
Tissy
29-12-2010
So looking forward to :- Stargazing Live on Monday night with my favourite man Brian Cox

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00wnvpf
xxtimbo
01-01-2011
I read that in former times
there were 13 months
each month had a fixed 28 days

thus 13 x 28 = 364
thus the common phrase in fairy tales
a year and a day

Time moved on and (maybe the church had something to do with it...)
but a 12 month calender was imposed .


Am I right in thinking that the waxing and waning of the moon in the course of a year is more in
line with 13 months than 12 ?

I also read that the moon circles the earth 13 times in a lunar year

If we went back to 13 months in a year... 13 moons etc
would we be more in sync with the Universe ?
lex parsimoniae
01-01-2011
Originally Posted by xxtimbo:
“If we went back to 13 months in a year... 13 moons etc
would we be more in sync with the Universe ?”

Wha.....................?
This thread is 'Space and Astronomy', not 'Psuedo-science and spiritual mumbo-jumbo'
xxtimbo
01-01-2011
Going back to the man on mars argument.. I think the future of space exploration will be carried out by robots.

The advances of the past few years are staggering .... with robots walking like humans, climbing stairs...
Eventually these robotic guys will be on the moon mining precious minerals.
Most likely it will be Japanese robots who carry out these missions I suspect that technologically they are far in advance of America and Europe right now.
Besides.. what is the conspiracy theory that says we ve never landed on the moon... the human body would be fried if it tried to get through the van allen radiation belt.... so those moon landings were carried out in big aircraft hangars in area 51 the top secret government facility .
TelevisionUser
03-01-2011
...is on tonight at 8pm on BBC2 and there're more details here http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00xcp7d for anyone who is interested. There will be two more episodes tomorrow and on Wednesday at the same time on the same channel.

Just thought you'd all like to know.
nitpick
03-01-2011
<bump> Don't forget, fellow Astronuts, we *expect* a good turnout for:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00wnvpf

Quote:
“Professor Brian Cox and Dara O Briain host three days of live stargazing featuring epic images from observatories around the globe.”

BBC2 Tonite at 20:00. (Great Minds, Heheh!)
Whirliegig
03-01-2011
I shall be watching this with my kids
afcbfan
03-01-2011
That's gonna hack some Darts' fans off!

Good for BBC for putting 3 hours of astronomy in a week on a mainstream channel. Normally we get 20 minutes a month.
Canard's Back
03-01-2011
good website to watch the show - and free to join:

http://www.tvcatchup.com/watch.html?c=2

(I usually have it running in the background whilst on-line).
Mallaha
03-01-2011
Originally Posted by xxtimbo:
“Going back to the man on mars argument.. I think the future of space exploration will be carried out by robots.
.”

There will eventually be a manned mission to Mars, if only because people do want to go there.

That's all the reasoning we need, really.
Carlos_dfc
03-01-2011
And a quick reminder of the partial solar eclipse tomorrow morning.
For more details, see my earlier thread..
http://www.digitalspy.co.uk/forums/s....php?t=1418794
TelevisionUser
03-01-2011
I thought Stargazing Live was fine to watch even though it's aimed at a general TV audience. I'll be watching over the next two nights as well.

Professor Brian Cox can be followed on Twitter here http://twitter.com/ProfBrianCox and his website's here http://www.apolloschildren.com/brian/.

Also, if anyone has Star Walk on an iPhone or Google Sky Maps on an Android mobile then you'll be able to see what stars, constellations and planets are in the night sky even when it's cloudy so that's a help with identifying things.
Bagpipes
05-01-2011
I thought I'd share some wonderful pictures of Earth taken from space by NASA astronaut Douglas Wheelock: http://triggerpit.com/2010/11/22/inc...naut-wheelock/
vinba
05-01-2011
Not sure if this qualifies but.. GSLVF06 was destroyed by the range controller after what initially points to the snapping of a group of 10 connectors located at the bottom portion of the Russian Cryogenic Stage. Not a great track record for the updated GSLV so far. Puts a bit of a dampener on the moon mission. Also the loss of GSAT-5P will have implications on the telecoms and weather forecasting ability
feelsolucky
05-01-2011
Updates on the Mars Rover, staggeringly reaching its 7th birthday next Monday is available here

http://marsrovers.jpl.nasa.gov/missi...tunityAll.html
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