CometIce and StoneWeek 27

Perihelion: 1861 June 12.01, q = 0.822 AU  Two of the brighter comets of the latter half of the 19th Century were discovered by an Australian amateur astronomer, John Tebbutt, who for four decades essentially ran a one-man astronomical clearinghouse from his private observatory near Windsor, New South Wales. In addition to numerous astrometric observations …

Ice and StoneTopicWeek 27

During the early morning hours on Tuesday, June 30, 1908, at around 7:17 A.M. local time, “something” entered the earth’s atmosphere near the Pacific coast of Asia, traveling northwestward. A few km above the surface of a largely uninhabited region of central Siberia, near the Stony Tunguska River some 90 km north-northwest of the village …

HistoryIce and StoneWeek 26

JUNE 22, 1978: U.S. Naval Observatory astronomer James Christy discovers Charon, Pluto’s first-known moon. Charon, the discovery of which would be confirmed with a series of transit and occultation events between it and Pluto that began in 1995, provided a major step in our understanding of Pluto’s size and physical nature. Pluto, its system of …

CometIce and StoneWeek 26

Perihelion: 2020 June 25.85, q = 0.337 AU  In the early 19th Century the idea that comets might return to the inner solar system on a regular basis was still a bit of a novelty. This had been successfully demonstrated by the British astronomer Edmond Halley when the comet that now bears his name returned …

Ice and StoneTopicWeek 26

“Ice and Stone 2020” participants have undoubtedly noticed that I have often discussed how this-or-that comet or asteroid will be returning to the inner solar system or passing by Earth at some point in the future, and perhaps have wondered how such things are determined. In principle, the processes by which such events are calculated …

Moon

Furthermore, it has been 10 years since the last SRBs arrived at KSC for the final NASA Space Shuttle mission. After the ten 10 SRB segments are stacked vertically they will form the two twin 177-foot-tall (53.9-meter) five-segment Solid Rocket Boosters for NASA’s gargantuan SLS Moon/Mars rocket. Together the twin SRBs will provide more than …

HistoryIce and StoneWeek 25

JUNE 14, 1770: The renowned French comet hunter Charles Messier discovers a moderately bright comet in Sagittarius. 2½ weeks later this comet passed just 0.015 AU from Earth, the closest confirmed cometary approach to Earth in history. The comet, named after Swedish mathematician Anders Lexell, who computed its orbit, was later perturbed into a much …

CometIce and StoneWeek 25

Perihelion: 2001 May 24.52, q = 0.779 AU  At the beginning of the 21st Century the discovery of comets and near-Earth asteroids was dominated by the first of the comprehensive sky surveys, the LIncoln Near-Earth Asteroid Research (LINEAR) program run by MIT’s Lincoln Laboratory and based at White Sands Missile Range in New Mexico, that …

Ice and StoneTopicWeek 25

Ever since the Italian astronomer Galileo Galilei turned his primitive telescope towards the moon on November 30, 1609 and saw them for the first time, we’ve known that the moon is covered with craters. These come in all sizes, from very large ones several hundred km across down to meter-size and smaller. For a long …

MarsWord Games

NASA and the United Arab Emirates are launching separate missions to Mars as early as next month. Although unconfirmed, it has been reported that China also may be sending a rover and orbiter to the Red Planet in July or August. Since 1960, more than 50 missions have been sent to Mars, with varying success. To …