Many folks would like to see us back on the Moon and developing its resources.

Friday, July 31, 2009

The Perseids are Coming

While planets may be hit by asteroids or comets, we can also pass through the debris from them.
Time to get out the easy chair and look up at the night sky.
See the link for more information on best viewing.
- LRK -

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The Perseids are Coming
http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2009/31jul_perseids2009.htm?list965414

July 31, 2009: Earth is entering a stream of dusty debris from Comet Swift-Tuttle, the source of the annual Perseid meteor shower. Although the shower won't peak until August 11th and 12th, the show is already getting underway.

Brian Emfinger of Ozark, Arkansas, photographed this early Perseid just after midnight on Sunday, July 26th:

http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2009/images/perseids2009/Brian-Emfinger2.jpg

"I used an off-the-shelf digital camera to capture this fireball and its smoky trail," says Emfinger. "It was a bright one!"

Don't get too excited, cautions Bill Cooke of NASA's Meteoroid Environment Office. "We're just in the outskirts of the debris stream now. If you go out at night and stare at the sky, you'll probably only see a few Perseids per hour."

This will change, however, as August unfolds.

"Earth passes through the densest part of the debris stream sometime on August 12th. Then, you could see dozens of meteors per hour.
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John sent a link that might indicate that Venus can be hit by comets as Jupiter may have experienced of late.
- LRK -

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http://www.livescience.com/space/090730-venus-bright-spot.html
Bright Spot on Venus Stumps Scientists
By Andrea Thompson, Senior Writer
posted: 30 July 2009 05:14 pm ET

A sudden bright spot that appeared in the clouds of Venus just days after a comet left a bruise on Jupiter has scientists stumped as to its cause.

Venus' bright spot, first noticed by amateur astronomer Frank Melillo of Holtsville, NY on July 19, is not the first such brightening noticed on our cloudy neighbor, said planetary scientist Sanjay Limaye of the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

"We have seen such events before," he told SPACE.com.
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http://www.space.com/scienceastronomy/090730-venus-bright-spot.html
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And while you are looking up from the comfort of your easy chair you might contemplate the constellation of Orion and the bright, bright star Betelgeuse.
What if it exploded while you were looking at it?
Would you catch it on your digital camera?
- LRK -

Link thanks to SpaceWarper.
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http://www.eso.org/public/outreach/press-rel/pr-2009/pr-27-09.html
ESO 27/09 - Science Release

29 July 2009
For immediate release
Sharpest views of Betelgeuse reveal how supergiant stars lose mass

Unveiling the true face of a behemoth

Using different state-of-the-art techniques on ESO's Very Large Telescope, two independent teams of astronomers have obtained the sharpest ever views of the supergiant star Betelgeuse. They show that the star has a vast plume of gas almost as large as our Solar System and a gigantic bubble boiling on its surface. These discoveries provide important clues to help explain how these mammoths shed material at such a tremendous rate.

Betelgeuse — the second brightest star in the constellation of Orion (the Hunter) — is a red supergiant, one of the biggest stars known, and almost 1000 times larger than our Sun [1]. It is also one of the most luminous stars known, emitting more light than 100 000 Suns. Such
extreme properties foretell the demise of a short-lived stellar king. With an age of only a few million years, Betelgeuse is already nearing the end of its life and is soon doomed to explode as a supernova. When it does, the supernova should be seen easily from Earth, even in broad
daylight.

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And if there are any life forms on planets in that area, will we receive a data dump of their life history in one last expression of their existence?
Will SETI pick up the death cry?
http://www.seti.org/Page.aspx?pid=1345

And if you were at Moon Base Alpha, would your radio telescope record the happening?
http://www.space1999.net/moonbase99/
http://www.space1999.net/

And if you would just like to go see the Moon using the new Google Earth information that NASA and JAXA have added information to, well check this out.
- LRK -

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http://www.nasa.gov/centers/ames/news/features/2009/Google_Moon.html
NASA and Google Launch Virtual Exploration of the Moon
07.20.09

Forty years ago on July 20, 1969, the world watched as the crew of Apollo 11 took the first steps on the surface of the moon.

To celebrate this historic occasion, NASA and Google announced the launch of the Moon in Google Earth, an interactive, 3D atlas of the moon, viewable with Google Earth 5.0.

The announcement was made during a press conference at the Newseum in Washington, featuring remarks by Apollo 11 astronaut Buzz Aldrin; Alan Eustace, a Google senior vice president; Andrew Chaikin, author and space historian; and Anousheh Ansari, the first female space tourist.

With the Moon in Google Earth, users can explore a virtual moonscape, follow guided tours from astronauts Buzz Aldrin and Jack Schmidt, view high-resolution "street view" style panoramic images and see previously unreleased footage captured from the lunar surface.

Whether rediscovering iconic moments from the history of lunar exploration, or learning about them for the first time, the Moon in Google Earth enables users to better understand the moon and mankind's relationship to it using an immersive, 3D experience.

snip
http://earth.google.com/moon/
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Thanks for looking up with me.


Larry Kellogg

Web Site: http://lkellogg.vttoth.com/LarryRussellKellogg/
BlogSpot: http://kelloggserialreports.blogspot.com/
RSS link: http://kelloggserialreports.blogspot.com/atom.xml
Newsletter: https://news.altair.com/mailman/listinfo/lunar-update
Twitter: http://twitter.com/lrkellogg
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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perseids
Perseids
-From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The Perseids (pronounced /ˈpɜrsiː.ɨdz/ us dict: pûr′·sē·ĭdz) are a prolific meteor shower associated with the comet Swift-Tuttle. The Perseids are so called because the point they appear to come from, called the radiant, lies in the constellation Perseus. Meteor showers occur when Earth moves through a meteor stream. The stream in this case is called the Perseid cloud and it stretches along the orbit of the Comet Swift-Tuttle. The cloud consists of particles ejected by the
comet as it passed by the Sun. Most of the dust in the cloud today is approximately a thousand years old. However, there is also a relatively young filament of dust in the stream that boiled off the comet in 1862. The rate of meteors originating from this filament is much higher than for the older part of the stream.

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http://www.universetoday.com/2009/07/20/land-on-the-moon-in-google-earth/
Land on the Moon in Google Earth

To celebrate the 40th anniversary of the Apollo 11 Moon landing, Google has launched a new feature: the Moon in Google Earth. You can now use Google Earth to explore, fly around and search the Moon. Google was able to get several astronauts to participate in this new
feature, and you can get tours of landing sites, narrated by Apollo astronauts, view 3D models of landed spacecraft, zoom into 360-degree photos to see astronauts' footprints and watch rare TV footage of the Apollo missions. The hi-resolution views of the Moon were developed in collaboration with NASA Ames Research and JAXA. It's loads of fun and provides an historic perspective as well as a look to the future of lunar exploration. If you already have Google Earth 5.0 on your computer, just click on the tab on the top toolbar that has a picture of Saturn, and click on Moon. If you click on the Apollo 11 flag, you can zoom in on that location and take a tour of the first landing site on the Moon! What a great way celebrate the 40th anniversary. Enjoy!

Link to the Moon in Google Earth.
http://earth.google.com/moon/index.html

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http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/32234721/ns/technology_and_science-space/
Space shuttle lands safely in Florida completed 16-day construction job at international space station

By Marcia Dunn

CAPE CANAVERAL, Florida - Space shuttle Endeavour and its seven astronauts returned to Earth on Friday, completing a long but successful construction job that boosted the size and power of the international space station.

Endeavour glided through a slightly hazy sky and touched down on Kennedy Space Center's landing strip. Its smooth and punctual late morning arrival set off a stream of praise.

"Congratulations on a superb mission from beginning to end. Very well done," Mission Control radioed.

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http://www.nasa.gov/home/hqnews/2009/jul/HQ_09_179_Shuttle_landing_success.html
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WHAT THE MIND CAN CONCEIVE, AND BELIEVE, IT WILL ACHIEVE - LRK

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