Webb takes infrared image of the disk of dust and debris surrounding Fomalhaut
Click for original image.
Using the mid-infrared instrument on the Webb Space Telescope, astronomers have obtained a new high resolution infrared image of the disk of dust and debris that surrounds the star Fomalhaut, and (surprise!) have it to be more complex than they previously believed.
That image is to the right, annotated by the science team.
Overall, there are three nested belts extending out to 14 billion miles (23 billion kilometers) from the star; that’s 150 times the distance of Earth from the Sun. The scale of the outermost belt is roughly twice the scale of our solar system’s Kuiper Belt of small bodies and cold dust beyond Neptune. The inner belts – which had never been seen before – were revealed by Webb for the first time.
The dust cloud identified in the outer ring is possibly left over from a recent collusion of larger bodies.
Click for original image.
Using the mid-infrared instrument on the Webb Space Telescope, astronomers have obtained a new high resolution infrared image of the disk of dust and debris that surrounds the star Fomalhaut, and (surprise!) have it to be more complex than they previously believed.
That image is to the right, annotated by the science team.
Overall, there are three nested belts extending out to 14 billion miles (23 billion kilometers) from the star; that’s 150 times the distance of Earth from the Sun. The scale of the outermost belt is roughly twice the scale of our solar system’s Kuiper Belt of small bodies and cold dust beyond Neptune. The inner belts – which had never been seen before – were revealed by Webb for the first time.
The dust cloud identified in the outer ring is possibly left over from a recent collusion of larger bodies.
On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.
The print edition can be purchased at Amazon or any other book seller. If you want an autographed copy the price is $60 for the hardback and $45 for the paperback, plus $8 shipping for each. Go here for purchasing details. The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.
The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News
May 8, 2023 Quick space links
Courtesy of BtB’s stringer Jay. I meanwhile am at a space symposium in Tucson today, so posting has been light. I should be home in time to do some work later this afternoon.
- Virgin Galaxtic to resume flights in May
The company is calling the May flight, carrying two Italian astronauts and delayed more than two years, its final checkout prior to beginning commercial flights in June..
- Buzz Aldrin promoted to Brigadier General
He is also now officially ranked as a Guardian in the Space Force.
- China’s next Tianzhou cargo freighter to station has 20% more cargo space
The extra space was created by moving some components from the cargo module to the service module. The freighter, which launches this week, has other enhancements as well.
- SpaceX’s entire fleet of Florida recovery ships at dock
As noted at the tweet, it is rare for all the ships to be together considering SpaceX’s busy launch schedule.
Courtesy of BtB’s stringer Jay. I meanwhile am at a space symposium in Tucson today, so posting has been light. I should be home in time to do some work later this afternoon.
- Virgin Galaxtic to resume flights in May
The company is calling the May flight, carrying two Italian astronauts and delayed more than two years, its final checkout prior to beginning commercial flights in June..
- Buzz Aldrin promoted to Brigadier General
He is also now officially ranked as a Guardian in the Space Force.
- China’s next Tianzhou cargo freighter to station has 20% more cargo space
The extra space was created by moving some components from the cargo module to the service module. The freighter, which launches this week, has other enhancements as well.
- SpaceX’s entire fleet of Florida recovery ships at dock
As noted at the tweet, it is rare for all the ships to be together considering SpaceX’s busy launch schedule.
Sinuous ridge inside Martian canyon
Click for original image.
Cool image time! The picture to the right, cropped, reduced, and sharpened to post here, was taken on February 7, 2023 by the high resolution camera on Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO). It shows what the camera team labels a “sinuous ridge within valley.”
The location is at 30 degrees south latitude, right on the edge of the southern of the two 30-60 degree mid-latitude bands where orbital images show many glacial features. Closer to the equator and there is little or no evidence of near surface ice on Mars. Farther from the equator from this latitude and the evidence of near surface ice increases, becoming very dominant the closer to the poles you get.
At this spot, it appears there is little near surface ice. The channel has ripple sand dunes inside it, and the sinuous ridge appears to be bedrock. Similarly, the plateau above the channel also appears like bedrock, the craters showing no evidence of splatter that is common where there is near surface ice.
What made the channel? And what made that a sinuous ridge inside it?
» Read more
Click for original image.
Cool image time! The picture to the right, cropped, reduced, and sharpened to post here, was taken on February 7, 2023 by the high resolution camera on Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO). It shows what the camera team labels a “sinuous ridge within valley.”
The location is at 30 degrees south latitude, right on the edge of the southern of the two 30-60 degree mid-latitude bands where orbital images show many glacial features. Closer to the equator and there is little or no evidence of near surface ice on Mars. Farther from the equator from this latitude and the evidence of near surface ice increases, becoming very dominant the closer to the poles you get.
At this spot, it appears there is little near surface ice. The channel has ripple sand dunes inside it, and the sinuous ridge appears to be bedrock. Similarly, the plateau above the channel also appears like bedrock, the craters showing no evidence of splatter that is common where there is near surface ice.
What made the channel? And what made that a sinuous ridge inside it?
» Read more
Now available in hardback and paperback as well as ebook!
From the press release: In this ground-breaking new history of early America, historian Robert Zimmerman not only exposes the lie behind The New York Times 1619 Project that falsely claims slavery is central to the history of the United States, he also provides profound lessons about the nature of human societies, lessons important for Americans today as well as for all future settlers on Mars and elsewhere in space.
Conscious Choice: The origins of slavery in America and why it matters today and for our future in outer space, is a riveting page-turning story that documents how slavery slowly became pervasive in the southern British colonies of North America, colonies founded by a people and culture that not only did not allow slavery but in every way were hostile to the practice.
Conscious Choice does more however. In telling the tragic history of the Virginia colony and the rise of slavery there, Zimmerman lays out the proper path for creating healthy societies in places like the Moon and Mars.
“Zimmerman’s ground-breaking history provides every future generation the basic framework for establishing new societies on other worlds. We would be wise to heed what he says.” —Robert Zubrin, founder of the Mars Society.
All editions are available at Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and all book vendors, with the ebook priced at $5.99 before discount. All editions can also be purchased direct from the ebook publisher, ebookit, in which case you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.
Autographed printed copies are also available at discount directly from the author (hardback $29.95; paperback $14.95; Shipping cost for either: $6.00). Just send an email to zimmerman @ nasw dot org.
China’s X-37B copy lands successfully after 276 days in orbit
China’s reusable mini-shuttle, essentially a copy of Boeing’s X-37B, has completed its second flight, landing in China on a runway after 276 days in orbit.
The project will provide a more convenient and inexpensive way to access space for the peaceful use of space in the future, according to the statement.
The reusable test spacecraft launched from Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center in the Gobi Desert Aug. 4 (UTC), 2022. The spacecraft released an object into orbit, U.S. Space Force tracking data revealed late last year. The small satellite operated in very close proximity to the spaceplane.
This apparent second flight on the secretive spacecraft differs from its first mission in 2020. That flight saw the spaceplane orbit for four days.
During the flight the spaceplane made numerous orbital maneuvers.
Like the X-37B, this reusable mini-shuttle allows China to do many technology experiments in orbit and then return them to Earth for analysis.
China’s reusable mini-shuttle, essentially a copy of Boeing’s X-37B, has completed its second flight, landing in China on a runway after 276 days in orbit.
The project will provide a more convenient and inexpensive way to access space for the peaceful use of space in the future, according to the statement.
The reusable test spacecraft launched from Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center in the Gobi Desert Aug. 4 (UTC), 2022. The spacecraft released an object into orbit, U.S. Space Force tracking data revealed late last year. The small satellite operated in very close proximity to the spaceplane.
This apparent second flight on the secretive spacecraft differs from its first mission in 2020. That flight saw the spaceplane orbit for four days.
During the flight the spaceplane made numerous orbital maneuvers.
Like the X-37B, this reusable mini-shuttle allows China to do many technology experiments in orbit and then return them to Earth for analysis.
Rocket Lab successfully launches two NASA hurricane monitoring cubesats
Rocket Lab’s Electron rocket today successfully placed NASA’s two Tropics hurricane monitoring cubesats into orbit, lifting off from New Zealand ((May 8th New Zealand time).
This is the first of two Rocket Lab launches to get the entire four-satellite Tropics constellation into orbit, with the second schedule for two weeks from now.
The leaders in the 2023 launch race:
29 SpaceX
16 China
6 Russia
4 Rocket Lab
American private enterprise now leads China 33 to 16 in the national rankings, and the entire world combined 33 to 28.
Rocket Lab’s Electron rocket today successfully placed NASA’s two Tropics hurricane monitoring cubesats into orbit, lifting off from New Zealand ((May 8th New Zealand time).
This is the first of two Rocket Lab launches to get the entire four-satellite Tropics constellation into orbit, with the second schedule for two weeks from now.
The leaders in the 2023 launch race:
29 SpaceX
16 China
6 Russia
4 Rocket Lab
American private enterprise now leads China 33 to 16 in the national rankings, and the entire world combined 33 to 28.
Leaving Earth: Space Stations, Rival Superpowers, and the Quest for Interplanetary Travel, can be purchased as an ebook everywhere for only $3.99 (before discount) at amazon, Barnes & Noble, all ebook vendors, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit.
If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big oppressive tech companies and I get a bigger cut much sooner.
Winner of the 2003 Eugene M. Emme Award of the American Astronautical Society.
"Leaving Earth is one of the best and certainly the most comprehensive summary of our drive into space that I have ever read. It will be invaluable to future scholars because it will tell them how the next chapter of human history opened." -- Arthur C. Clarke
Brick Experiment – 20 Mechanical Principles combined in a Useless Lego Machine
An evening pause: How many of you have heard the names of these various items when talking to your car mechanic, and have no idea what they are?
Hat tip Wayne DeVette.
May 5, 2023 Zimmerman/Batchelor podcast
Embedded below the fold in two parts.
To listen to all of John Batchelor’s podcasts, go here.
» Read more
Embedded below the fold in two parts.
To listen to all of John Batchelor’s podcasts, go here.
» Read more
May 5, 2023 Quick space links
Courtesy of BtB’s stringer Jay, who has also noticed, as I have, that the news in commercial space has been slow this week.
- Tianzhou-5 has undocked from Tiangong-5 but will fly in formation and then redock to different port, after the present Shenzhou crew departs
The Chinese are clearly practicing the formation flying that will be required almost continually when they launch their Hubble-class orbiting optical telescope next year.
- Orbex breaks ground on first launchpad at Sutherland spaceport in Scotland
Orbex is another smallsat rocket startup that hopes to launch its orbital Prime rocket from Sutherland before the end of the year.
- Delayed Rocket Lab launch now hopes the weather will allow a lift-off on May 8, 2023 (New Zealand time), or 9 pm (Eastern) on May 7th
A launch attempt last week was canceled due to weather.
Courtesy of BtB’s stringer Jay, who has also noticed, as I have, that the news in commercial space has been slow this week.
- Tianzhou-5 has undocked from Tiangong-5 but will fly in formation and then redock to different port, after the present Shenzhou crew departs
The Chinese are clearly practicing the formation flying that will be required almost continually when they launch their Hubble-class orbiting optical telescope next year.
- Orbex breaks ground on first launchpad at Sutherland spaceport in Scotland
Orbex is another smallsat rocket startup that hopes to launch its orbital Prime rocket from Sutherland before the end of the year.
- Delayed Rocket Lab launch now hopes the weather will allow a lift-off on May 8, 2023 (New Zealand time), or 9 pm (Eastern) on May 7th
A launch attempt last week was canceled due to weather.
The modern corrupt legislative way of doing business: Know nothing, fund everything!
It doesn’t matter how much money is in the government treasury,
our government will fill this check out anyway, to the max.
This week the Democrat-controlled legislature of the state of California passed a bill allocating $150 million dollars from which cash-strapped hospitals could obtain loans to help pay their bills.
The state will give out the $150 million in the form of interest-free loans to nonprofit or public hospitals that meet certain conditions. The state will prioritize loans for medical centers in rural areas and those that have a disproportionate number of patients on Medicaid, the joint state and federal government health insurance program for the poor and the disabled.
Loans will have to be repaid in six years, though it will be possible for the loan to be forgiven if the hospital meets certain requirements.
In another news report describing the process in which this bill was approved and passed included one particular quote that illustrated magnificently the modern manner in which almost all American legislatures now function, from small city councils to Congress in Washington, regardless of party. As stated by one state senator during preliminary hearings before the bill passed:
“We don’t know how many hospitals, we don’t know which hospitals. We don’t know which areas those hospitals are (in), we don’t know anything. And now we’re asked to approve $150 million to be doled out without access to plans, without access to the finances that would give us the evidence to feel comfortable with this,” said Sen. Maria Elena Durazo, a Los Angeles Democrat, during a Senate budget committee hearing on Tuesday. [emphasis mine]
Brain terrain on top of Martian mountains
Click for original image.
Cool image time! The picture to the right, cropped and reduced to post here, was taken on March 26, 2023 by the high resolution camera on Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO). It is labeled by the scientists “Brain Terrain on Floor of Crater in Warrego Valles.”
Brain terrain is a geological feature entirely unique to Mars that remains unexplained in any way by geologists. The scientists know it is almost certainly related to near-surface ice and its sublimation into gas, but their theories as to its precise formation process remain incomplete and unconvincing, even to them.
In this case the brain terrain’s interweaving nodules seem to show flow patterns, but strangely those patterns go around depressions and hollows. Yet, the overall flow direction also seems to point downhill towards the slope on the image’s right edge.
» Read more
Click for original image.
Cool image time! The picture to the right, cropped and reduced to post here, was taken on March 26, 2023 by the high resolution camera on Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO). It is labeled by the scientists “Brain Terrain on Floor of Crater in Warrego Valles.”
Brain terrain is a geological feature entirely unique to Mars that remains unexplained in any way by geologists. The scientists know it is almost certainly related to near-surface ice and its sublimation into gas, but their theories as to its precise formation process remain incomplete and unconvincing, even to them.
In this case the brain terrain’s interweaving nodules seem to show flow patterns, but strangely those patterns go around depressions and hollows. Yet, the overall flow direction also seems to point downhill towards the slope on the image’s right edge.
» Read more
Hubble captures shadows on star’s outer accretion disk cast by inner accretion disk
Click for original image.
Astronomers using the Hubble Space Telescope’s images taken five years apart have captured the changing shadows cast by a star’s inner accretion disk onto its outer accretion disk.
Those images are to the right, reduced and rearranged to post here. From the caption:
Comparison images from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope, taken several years apart, have uncovered two eerie shadows moving counterclockwise across a disc of gas and dust encircling the young star TW Hydrae. The discs are tilted face-on as seen from Earth and so give astronomers a bird’s-eye view of what’s happening around the star.
The [top] image, taken in 2016, shows just one shadow [A] at the 11 o’clock position. This shadow is cast by an inner disc that is slightly inclined to the outer disc and so blocks starlight. The picture on the [bottom] shows a second shadow that emerged from yet another nested disc at the 7 o’clock position, as photographed in 2021. What was originally the inner disc is marked [B] in this later view.
The shadows rotate around the star at different rates like the hand on a clock. They are evidence for two unseen planets that have pulled dust into their orbits. This makes them slightly inclined to each other. This is a visible-light photo taken with the Space Telescope Imaging Spectrograph. Artificial colour has been added to enhance details.
An artist’s conception of the system, as seen from an oblique angle, is available here. All told, this solar system of disks kind of resembles a spinning gyroscope, with its different rings tilted at different angles to conserve angular momentum.
Click for original image.
Astronomers using the Hubble Space Telescope’s images taken five years apart have captured the changing shadows cast by a star’s inner accretion disk onto its outer accretion disk.
Those images are to the right, reduced and rearranged to post here. From the caption:
Comparison images from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope, taken several years apart, have uncovered two eerie shadows moving counterclockwise across a disc of gas and dust encircling the young star TW Hydrae. The discs are tilted face-on as seen from Earth and so give astronomers a bird’s-eye view of what’s happening around the star.
The [top] image, taken in 2016, shows just one shadow [A] at the 11 o’clock position. This shadow is cast by an inner disc that is slightly inclined to the outer disc and so blocks starlight. The picture on the [bottom] shows a second shadow that emerged from yet another nested disc at the 7 o’clock position, as photographed in 2021. What was originally the inner disc is marked [B] in this later view.
The shadows rotate around the star at different rates like the hand on a clock. They are evidence for two unseen planets that have pulled dust into their orbits. This makes them slightly inclined to each other. This is a visible-light photo taken with the Space Telescope Imaging Spectrograph. Artificial colour has been added to enhance details.
An artist’s conception of the system, as seen from an oblique angle, is available here. All told, this solar system of disks kind of resembles a spinning gyroscope, with its different rings tilted at different angles to conserve angular momentum.
Celestis recovers astronaut’s remains from suborbital rocket explosion
Celestis, the company that specializes in sending people’s ashes into space, has successfully recovered the remains of a former Apollo astronaut Philip Chapman (who never flew in space) after the suborbital rocket they were on exploded four seconds into flight.
“All 120 flight capsules are safely in the hands of launch personnel and will be returned to us awaiting our next flight as soon as UP and Spaceport America complete their investigation and any required fixes are implemented,” Celestis said in a statement on Wednesday. The recovered payloads are set to fly again on board the company’s upcoming Perseverance Flight. The company said it only launches a “symbolic portion” of ashes or DNA sample from its participants.
Celestis has sent remains of many celebrities as well as ordinary customers on a number of orbital and suborbital flights over the years. The recovery of the remains and their expected reflight in this case enhances its business model, since none of its customers want their ashes lost in a rocket failure, before reaching space.
Celestis, the company that specializes in sending people’s ashes into space, has successfully recovered the remains of a former Apollo astronaut Philip Chapman (who never flew in space) after the suborbital rocket they were on exploded four seconds into flight.
“All 120 flight capsules are safely in the hands of launch personnel and will be returned to us awaiting our next flight as soon as UP and Spaceport America complete their investigation and any required fixes are implemented,” Celestis said in a statement on Wednesday. The recovered payloads are set to fly again on board the company’s upcoming Perseverance Flight. The company said it only launches a “symbolic portion” of ashes or DNA sample from its participants.
Celestis has sent remains of many celebrities as well as ordinary customers on a number of orbital and suborbital flights over the years. The recovery of the remains and their expected reflight in this case enhances its business model, since none of its customers want their ashes lost in a rocket failure, before reaching space.
Lockheed Martin reorganizes its space divisions to better compete in the new commercial market
Lockheed Martin today announced that it is reorganizing its space divisions to make them better aligned with the new commercial market, and thus better able to win market share.
The company will streamline its operation from “five lines of business to three,” the first focused on commercial space, the second focused on classified military projects, and the third focused on military missile work.
As a big space company, Lockheed Martin has made a great effort in recent years to break into the commercial rocket industry. It was a major investor in Rocket Lab, and is also a major investor in the rocket startup ABL, which it is sending a lot of business. It also realigned its satellite construction business to focus on smallsats, including investing a lot of money in the smallsat company Terran Orbital.
This reorganization is clearly an effort to underline these changes. Whether it will work remains to be seen. Often such reorganizations in big older corporations end up being nothing more than rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic.
Lockheed Martin today announced that it is reorganizing its space divisions to make them better aligned with the new commercial market, and thus better able to win market share.
The company will streamline its operation from “five lines of business to three,” the first focused on commercial space, the second focused on classified military projects, and the third focused on military missile work.
As a big space company, Lockheed Martin has made a great effort in recent years to break into the commercial rocket industry. It was a major investor in Rocket Lab, and is also a major investor in the rocket startup ABL, which it is sending a lot of business. It also realigned its satellite construction business to focus on smallsats, including investing a lot of money in the smallsat company Terran Orbital.
This reorganization is clearly an effort to underline these changes. Whether it will work remains to be seen. Often such reorganizations in big older corporations end up being nothing more than rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic.
ESA finally admits — sort of — that private enterprise can do it better
Stéphane Israël, the head of Arianespace and the
architect of its failure to compete in the field of rocketry.
Today there was a news report in which Stéphane Israël, the head of Arianespace, kind of admitted at last that the expendable design of Europe’s new Ariane-6 rocket was a mistake, and that it will take a decade more to fix it.
“When the decisions were made on Ariane 6, we did so with the technologies that were available to quickly introduce a new rocket,” said Israël, according to European Spaceflight.
He added that it will not be until the 2030s before Europe begins flying its own reuseable rocket.
Israël’s comments illustrate the head-in-the-sand approach he has exhibited now for decades. He claims the European Space Agency (ESA) chose to make Ariane-6 expandable so that it would be ready quickly, but its development has not been fast, and in fact is now more than three years behind schedule. When it finally begins flying operational it will have taken almost a decade to create it.
His comments also are his lame attempt to push back against a recent ESA report [pdf], issued in late March, that strongly rejected the decades-long model that ESA has used to build its rockets. Up until now and including the construction of Ariane-6, ESA designed and built its rockets, using Arianespace, headed by Israël, as its commercial arm. In other words, the government ran the show, much like NASA did for most of the half century following the 1960s space race. The result was slow development, and expensive rockets. Arianespace for example never made a profit in its decades-long existence, despite capturing half the commercial market in the 2000s and early 2010s.
The March ESA report rejected this model, and instead advocating copying what the U.S. has done for the past half decade by shifting ownership and design to the private sector, as advocated in my 2017 policy paper, Capitalism in space. To quote the ESA report:
» Read more
Hozier & Annie Lennox – Take Me to Church / I Put a Spell on You
A evening pause: Performed live 2015.
Hat tip Doug Johnson. Note too that this does not come from youtube, but from metatube. Let’s find more alternative video resources like this, just to increase some competition.
May 4, 2023 Quick space links
Courtesy of BtB’s stringer Jay.
- Chinese pseudo-company touts its next launch in June of it recoverable orbital unmanned capsule
According to the tweet thread, the company has done other suborbital flights. The concept is essentially a steal of Russia’s own unmanned orbital capsule that it has been flying both materials and biological experiments for decades.
- Short movie of Zhurong images as it approached its back cover and parachute in July 2021.
Nothing new here. Zhurong remains in hibernation, or dead, depending on what happens next.
Courtesy of BtB’s stringer Jay.
- Chinese pseudo-company touts its next launch in June of it recoverable orbital unmanned capsule
According to the tweet thread, the company has done other suborbital flights. The concept is essentially a steal of Russia’s own unmanned orbital capsule that it has been flying both materials and biological experiments for decades.
- Short movie of Zhurong images as it approached its back cover and parachute in July 2021.
Nothing new here. Zhurong remains in hibernation, or dead, depending on what happens next.
Weird dome near Starship candidate landing zone on Mars
Click for original image.
Cool image time! The picture to the right, rotated, cropped, reduced, and sharpened to post here, was taken on February 27, 2023 by the high resolution camera on Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO). It shows what the scientists label as domes in Arcadia Planitia, one of the many large northern lowland plains of Mars.
This to me is a “What the heck?” image. I won’t dare try to explain the warped concentric ringed pattern at the top of the mesa, nor the bright and dark splotch that surrounds it. The small craters around it appear to have glacier material within them, and the terrain here likely has a lot of near surface ice, being at 37 degrees north latitude in a region where the data suggests such ice exists. The different colors here likely indicate the difference between dust (orange) and coarser material (aqua).
The location, as shown in the overview map below, makes this mesa more tantalizing.
» Read more
Click for original image.
Cool image time! The picture to the right, rotated, cropped, reduced, and sharpened to post here, was taken on February 27, 2023 by the high resolution camera on Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO). It shows what the scientists label as domes in Arcadia Planitia, one of the many large northern lowland plains of Mars.
This to me is a “What the heck?” image. I won’t dare try to explain the warped concentric ringed pattern at the top of the mesa, nor the bright and dark splotch that surrounds it. The small craters around it appear to have glacier material within them, and the terrain here likely has a lot of near surface ice, being at 37 degrees north latitude in a region where the data suggests such ice exists. The different colors here likely indicate the difference between dust (orange) and coarser material (aqua).
The location, as shown in the overview map below, makes this mesa more tantalizing.
» Read more
Today’s blacklisted American: Biden administration threatens to shut down Catholic hospital system because of a candle
The evil candle that the Biden administration insists must be snuffed out,
or else the hospital must close.
They’re coming for you next: Because the Saint Francis Health System in Oklahoma has always kept a single candle lit in its hospital chapels, Biden administration officials are now threatening to shut down five Catholic hospitals in Oklahoma, citing federal government fire safety requirements.
If Saint Francis does not comply, the government will revoke its ability to obtain any Medicare, Medicaid, and the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP) payments for treating patients, in essence blocking those patients from healthcare while threatening the entire Saint Francis Health System with bankruptcy.
In response, the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty (as legal representative of St. Francis) sent a letter [pdf] in protest, noting that the Biden administration’s goal has nothing to do with fire safety, but to censor and squelch the religious practice of the St. Francis Health System:
» Read more
The evil candle that the Biden administration insists must be snuffed out,
or else the hospital must close.
They’re coming for you next: Because the Saint Francis Health System in Oklahoma has always kept a single candle lit in its hospital chapels, Biden administration officials are now threatening to shut down five Catholic hospitals in Oklahoma, citing federal government fire safety requirements.
If Saint Francis does not comply, the government will revoke its ability to obtain any Medicare, Medicaid, and the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP) payments for treating patients, in essence blocking those patients from healthcare while threatening the entire Saint Francis Health System with bankruptcy.
In response, the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty (as legal representative of St. Francis) sent a letter [pdf] in protest, noting that the Biden administration’s goal has nothing to do with fire safety, but to censor and squelch the religious practice of the St. Francis Health System:
» Read more
Two interacting galaxies, both with active supermassive black holes at their center
Click for original image.
Cool image time! The picture to the right, cropped and reduced to post here, was taken by the Hubble Space Telescope and released today. From the caption:
This new image from NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope shows interacting galaxies known as AM 1214-255. These galaxies contain active galactic nuclei, or AGNs. An AGN is an extraordinarily luminous central region of a galaxy. Its extreme brightness is caused by matter whirling into a supermassive black hole at the galaxy’s heart.
Hubble observed the galaxy [on the right] as part of an AGN survey, with the aim of compiling a dataset about nearby AGNs to be used as a resource for astronomers investigating AGN physics, black holes, host galaxy structure, and more.
Note how the outer arms of both galaxies appear warped, with long streams of stars being pulled towards the other galaxy. Imagine living on a planet orbiting one of those stars as it finds itself over time farther and farther from its home galaxy, out in the vast emptiness of intergalactic space. While this sounds lonely, it has advantages for life, because isolated from the galaxy the star will not be threatened by supernovae, gamma ray bursts, and the host of other events that happen inside galaxies that can threaten biology.
It also means your night sky will be heralded by the rising and setting of two nearby giant galaxies.
Click for original image.
Cool image time! The picture to the right, cropped and reduced to post here, was taken by the Hubble Space Telescope and released today. From the caption:
This new image from NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope shows interacting galaxies known as AM 1214-255. These galaxies contain active galactic nuclei, or AGNs. An AGN is an extraordinarily luminous central region of a galaxy. Its extreme brightness is caused by matter whirling into a supermassive black hole at the galaxy’s heart.
Hubble observed the galaxy [on the right] as part of an AGN survey, with the aim of compiling a dataset about nearby AGNs to be used as a resource for astronomers investigating AGN physics, black holes, host galaxy structure, and more.
Note how the outer arms of both galaxies appear warped, with long streams of stars being pulled towards the other galaxy. Imagine living on a planet orbiting one of those stars as it finds itself over time farther and farther from its home galaxy, out in the vast emptiness of intergalactic space. While this sounds lonely, it has advantages for life, because isolated from the galaxy the star will not be threatened by supernovae, gamma ray bursts, and the host of other events that happen inside galaxies that can threaten biology.
It also means your night sky will be heralded by the rising and setting of two nearby giant galaxies.
Two Russian astronauts shift airlock on ISS during 7-hour spacewalk
With the help of the new European robot arm on the Russian half of ISS, two Russian astronauts completed a 7-hour spacewalk yesterday, successfully shifting a Russian airlock module to the new Nauka module on ISS.
The cosmonauts began their spacewalk at 11:01 p.m. Moscow time on Wednesday and spent seven hours and ten minutes outside the International Space Station (ISS). The main objective of their extravehicular activities was to transfer an airlock from the Rassvet module to the Nauka multi-purpose laboratory module. It was done with the help of the ERA robotic arm under the remote control of cosmonaut Andrey Fedyaev, who stayed aboard the ISS.
The work is part of an ongoing series of spacewalks required to complete the installation of Nauka to the station.
With the help of the new European robot arm on the Russian half of ISS, two Russian astronauts completed a 7-hour spacewalk yesterday, successfully shifting a Russian airlock module to the new Nauka module on ISS.
The cosmonauts began their spacewalk at 11:01 p.m. Moscow time on Wednesday and spent seven hours and ten minutes outside the International Space Station (ISS). The main objective of their extravehicular activities was to transfer an airlock from the Rassvet module to the Nauka multi-purpose laboratory module. It was done with the help of the ERA robotic arm under the remote control of cosmonaut Andrey Fedyaev, who stayed aboard the ISS.
The work is part of an ongoing series of spacewalks required to complete the installation of Nauka to the station.
Maxar sale closes and company goes private
With the purchase today for $6.4 billion of the satellite company Maxar by two private investment firms, its stock was removed from the NY stock exchange and is no longer traded publicly.
The company was acquired for $53 per share by the U.S. private equity firm Advent International and minority investor British Columbia Investment Management Corp. in a deal announced in December. “With the closing of the transaction, Maxar will remain a U.S.-controlled, owned and operated company,” the company said. Maxar’s common stock will also be delisted from the Toronto Stock Exchange.
Maxar started trading on the New York Stock Exchange and the Toronto Stock Exchange in 2017. It officially became a U.S. corporation in 2020 when the company spun off the Canadian subsidiary MDA.
The desire of these private investors to spend so much strongly indicates that Maxar has real value. It also indicates indirectly the strength of the emerging new commercial launch market. These investors clearly believe that this launch market will continue to grow and force the launch price of its satellites to go down.
With the purchase today for $6.4 billion of the satellite company Maxar by two private investment firms, its stock was removed from the NY stock exchange and is no longer traded publicly.
The company was acquired for $53 per share by the U.S. private equity firm Advent International and minority investor British Columbia Investment Management Corp. in a deal announced in December. “With the closing of the transaction, Maxar will remain a U.S.-controlled, owned and operated company,” the company said. Maxar’s common stock will also be delisted from the Toronto Stock Exchange.
Maxar started trading on the New York Stock Exchange and the Toronto Stock Exchange in 2017. It officially became a U.S. corporation in 2020 when the company spun off the Canadian subsidiary MDA.
The desire of these private investors to spend so much strongly indicates that Maxar has real value. It also indicates indirectly the strength of the emerging new commercial launch market. These investors clearly believe that this launch market will continue to grow and force the launch price of its satellites to go down.
SpaceX launches 56 Starlink satellites into orbit
Using its Falcon 9 rocket, SpaceX tonight successfully placed 56 Starlink satellites into orbit, lifting off from Cape Canaveral.
The first stage completed its seventh flight, landing safely on a drone ship in the Atlantic. The two fairing halves completed their eighth and ninth flights, respectively.
The leaders in the 2023 launch race:
29 SpaceX
16 China
6 Russia
3 Rocket Lab
3 India
American private enterprise now leads China 32 to 16 in the national rankings, and the entire world combined 32 to 28. SpaceX now trails the rest of the world, including American companies, 29 to 31.
Using its Falcon 9 rocket, SpaceX tonight successfully placed 56 Starlink satellites into orbit, lifting off from Cape Canaveral.
The first stage completed its seventh flight, landing safely on a drone ship in the Atlantic. The two fairing halves completed their eighth and ninth flights, respectively.
The leaders in the 2023 launch race:
29 SpaceX
16 China
6 Russia
3 Rocket Lab
3 India
American private enterprise now leads China 32 to 16 in the national rankings, and the entire world combined 32 to 28. SpaceX now trails the rest of the world, including American companies, 29 to 31.
May 10, 2023 Zimmerman/Batchelor podcast
Embedded below the fold in two parts.
To listen to all of John Batchelor’s podcasts, go here.
» Read more
Embedded below the fold in two parts.
To listen to all of John Batchelor’s podcasts, go here.
» Read more
Rollerman – Downhill extreme
May 3, 2023 Quick space links
Courtesy of BtB’s stringer Jay.
- SpaceX releases video taken from one fairing on its descent after release from Falcon Heavy
Quite cool. As the tweet notes, this “was the hottest and fastest [fairing return] we’ve ever attempted.”
- NASA whines it might not have enough plutonium for future deep space missions
Most of this is simply lobbying for more money. The shortage of plutonium will only matter if NASA’s planetary program gets a gigantic budget boost.
Courtesy of BtB’s stringer Jay.
- SpaceX releases video taken from one fairing on its descent after release from Falcon Heavy
Quite cool. As the tweet notes, this “was the hottest and fastest [fairing return] we’ve ever attempted.”
- NASA whines it might not have enough plutonium for future deep space missions
Most of this is simply lobbying for more money. The shortage of plutonium will only matter if NASA’s planetary program gets a gigantic budget boost.
In a Martian cold cauldron, boil and bake
Click for original image.
Cool image time! My headline paraphrases slightly the witches’ chant from Shakespeare’s MacBeth, if only to make it more accurately describe the picture to the right, cropped and reduced to post here. Taken on January 5, 2023 by the high resolution camera on Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO), it shows a patch of mid-latitude terrain in the icy northern lowland plains of Mars.
While some of the craters here were certainly caused by impact, it is also likely that most were instead cryo-volcanic in nature, whereby ice bubbles up from below as changing temperature conditions — none of which need to be very warm — cause it to either melt temporarily into liquid or sublimate directly into a gas. The dark pimplelike hole on the picture’s right edge is a perfect example, with the hole sitting at the top of a cone.
» Read more
Click for original image.
Cool image time! My headline paraphrases slightly the witches’ chant from Shakespeare’s MacBeth, if only to make it more accurately describe the picture to the right, cropped and reduced to post here. Taken on January 5, 2023 by the high resolution camera on Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO), it shows a patch of mid-latitude terrain in the icy northern lowland plains of Mars.
While some of the craters here were certainly caused by impact, it is also likely that most were instead cryo-volcanic in nature, whereby ice bubbles up from below as changing temperature conditions — none of which need to be very warm — cause it to either melt temporarily into liquid or sublimate directly into a gas. The dark pimplelike hole on the picture’s right edge is a perfect example, with the hole sitting at the top of a cone.
» Read more
Pushback: Court rules that PA school district denied parent public documents in “bad faith”
Megan Brock, without question still
being targeted by the government
Bring a gun to a knife fight: When Pennsylvania parent Megan Brock demanded, under her state’s right-to-know law, public documents of the Bucks County health department concerning its decisions to impose Wuhan flu lockdowns and school closures (with the office of open records ruling in her favor), county officials then sued her multiple times to try to prevent her access to the records.
The court has now ruled against the county’s lawsuits, while also ruling that the county had operated in “bad faith” and fined it $1,500, the maximum allowed by law.
After the court conducted an in-camera review of the records, Judge Denise M. Bowman ruled on April 28 that more than half of Brock’s requests, which were made under the state’s Right-to-Know Law (RTK), had been withheld “in bad faith.” She ordered the county to release certain documents and pay $1,500 in sanctions for each of the two lawsuits brought against Brock, the maximum allowed under RTK.
You can read the ruling here [pdf]. It notes in particular how county officials had even refused to provide the court one of these documents for review, demonstrating clearly its bad faith.
» Read more
Megan Brock, without question still
being targeted by the government
Bring a gun to a knife fight: When Pennsylvania parent Megan Brock demanded, under her state’s right-to-know law, public documents of the Bucks County health department concerning its decisions to impose Wuhan flu lockdowns and school closures (with the office of open records ruling in her favor), county officials then sued her multiple times to try to prevent her access to the records.
The court has now ruled against the county’s lawsuits, while also ruling that the county had operated in “bad faith” and fined it $1,500, the maximum allowed by law.
After the court conducted an in-camera review of the records, Judge Denise M. Bowman ruled on April 28 that more than half of Brock’s requests, which were made under the state’s Right-to-Know Law (RTK), had been withheld “in bad faith.” She ordered the county to release certain documents and pay $1,500 in sanctions for each of the two lawsuits brought against Brock, the maximum allowed under RTK.
You can read the ruling here [pdf]. It notes in particular how county officials had even refused to provide the court one of these documents for review, demonstrating clearly its bad faith.
» Read more
May 2, 2023 Zimmerman/Pratt on Texas podcast
I appeared on Robert Pratt’s Pratt on Texas podcast yesterday, doing a short ten minute interview about the lawsuit filed against the FAA that is attempting to shut down Starship/Superheavy development.
That podcast is embedded below. It can also be listened to here, beginning at 12:15 minutes.
» Read more
I appeared on Robert Pratt’s Pratt on Texas podcast yesterday, doing a short ten minute interview about the lawsuit filed against the FAA that is attempting to shut down Starship/Superheavy development.
That podcast is embedded below. It can also be listened to here, beginning at 12:15 minutes.
» Read more
SuperBIT balloon circling Antarctica snaps more high resolution astronomical pictures
Click for full image.
The Super-Pressure Balloon Imaging Telescope (Super-BIT) that has been circling Antarctica for the last two weeks has now obtained two more more high resolution wide-field astronomical pictures.
The picture to the right, cropped to post here, is of Messier 104 (the Sombrero Galaxy). While the telescope cannot zoom in closer than this to such objects, it is able to get much wider and sharp pictures, covering an entire galaxy or nebula that ground-based telescope using adaptive optics (designed to counter the fuzziness caused by the atmosphere) cannot. Adaptive optics only work on very small fields of view, thus making it unable to observe some of the larger nearby astronomical objects like galaxies and nebulae.
If you look at the live stream of the balloon’s track, it has now almost completed its second circuit of Antarctica.
Click for full image.
The Super-Pressure Balloon Imaging Telescope (Super-BIT) that has been circling Antarctica for the last two weeks has now obtained two more more high resolution wide-field astronomical pictures.
The picture to the right, cropped to post here, is of Messier 104 (the Sombrero Galaxy). While the telescope cannot zoom in closer than this to such objects, it is able to get much wider and sharp pictures, covering an entire galaxy or nebula that ground-based telescope using adaptive optics (designed to counter the fuzziness caused by the atmosphere) cannot. Adaptive optics only work on very small fields of view, thus making it unable to observe some of the larger nearby astronomical objects like galaxies and nebulae.
If you look at the live stream of the balloon’s track, it has now almost completed its second circuit of Antarctica.