Special Topic: Meteorites
Interplanetary space in the vicinity of Earth’s orbit – and, presumably, elsewhere as well – is littered with debris. Dust ejected from comets, bits and pieces of asteroids, rocks from various bodies . . . Meanwhile, Earth during its annual orbits around the sun is constantly sweeping up this debris. From the standpoint of terminology, …
Hubble Space Telescope Word Search
The Hubble Space Telescope is celebrating the 30th anniversary of its deployment into orbit on April 25, 1990. While Hubble opened up our eyes to the vastness of the Universe, we’ve hidden 44 words related to it in this Word Search puzzle. The words may be horizontal, vertical or diagonal. If you would like to …
QuizMe: Project Apollo
Project Apollo encompassed more than 400,000 Americans working together to make it possible for 24 NASA astronauts to journey to the Moon between 1968 and 1972. This mammoth engineering feat is the featured topic in this edition of our QuizMe series of educational content. Put your knowledge to the test with these 11 questions about …
This Week in History: April 19-25
APRIL 20, 1910: Comet 1P/Halley passes through perihelion at a heliocentric distance of 0.587 AU. Halley’s 1910 return, which is described in a previous “Special Topics” presentation, was quite favorable, with a close approach to Earth (0.15 AU) and the exhibiting of the longest cometary tail ever recorded. APRIL 20, 2025: NASA’s Lucy mission is …
Comet of the Week: Arend-Roland 1956h
Perihelion: 1957 April 8.03, q= 0.316 AU There weren’t any bright comets that appeared the year I was born, 1958, but two bright comets appeared the previous year. These two objects were the brightest comets to become easily visible from the northern hemisphere since the return of Comet 1P/Halley in 1910. The first of the …
Special Topic: Designations and Names of “Small Bodies”
Throughout “Ice and Stone 2020” I refer to numerous specific objects, including in all of my “Comet of the Week” presentations as well as in several of my “Special Topics” presentations and in the lists of weekly historical events. It is appropriate, then, to discuss how these various objects are designated and named. The conventions …