Author Topic: The Official Space Exploration Thread  (Read 230916 times)

Offline Phrubruh

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Re: The Official Space Exploration Thread
« Reply #1155 on: July 16, 2015, 11:01 AM »
Gotta love xmodem protocol.
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Offline JediJman

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Re: The Official Space Exploration Thread
« Reply #1156 on: July 16, 2015, 02:55 PM »
Pluto has "smuggler's hideout" written all over it.
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Offline Phrubruh

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Re: The Official Space Exploration Thread
« Reply #1157 on: July 16, 2015, 03:35 PM »
Nay, it looks like a space station to me...

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Offline DSJ™

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Re: The Official Space Exploration Thread
« Reply #1158 on: July 16, 2015, 06:21 PM »
This new image of an area on Pluto's largest moon Charon has a captivating feature—a depression with a peak in the middle, shown here in the upper left corner of the inset.

The image shows an area approximately 240 miles (390 kilometers) from top to bottom, including few visible craters. “The most intriguing feature is a large mountain sitting in a moat,” said Jeff Moore with NASA’s Ames Research Center, Moffett Field, California, who leads New Horizons’ Geology, Geophysics and Imaging team. “This is a feature that has geologists stunned and stumped.”

This image gives a preview of what the surface of this large moon will look like in future close-ups from NASA's New Horizons spacecraft. This image is heavily compressed; sharper versions are anticipated when the full-fidelity data from New Horizons' Long Range Reconnaissance Imager (LORRI) are returned to Earth.

The rectangle superimposed on the global view of Charon shows the approximate location of this close-up view.

The image was taken at approximately 6:30 a.m. EDT (10:30 UTC) on July 14, 2015, about 1.5 hours before closest approach to Pluto, from a range of 49,000 miles (79,000 kilometers).


Credit: NASA-JHUAPL-SwR

Offline Matt_Fury

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Re: The Official Space Exploration Thread
« Reply #1159 on: July 16, 2015, 11:59 PM »
I was hoping that they would find the Mass Relay.   :(
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Offline Phrubruh

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Re: The Official Space Exploration Thread
« Reply #1160 on: July 17, 2015, 09:28 AM »
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Offline DSJ™

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Re: The Official Space Exploration Thread
« Reply #1161 on: July 20, 2015, 06:00 PM »
A NASA camera on the Deep Space Climate Observatory satellite has returned its first view of the entire sunlit side of Earth from one million miles away. The image was taken July 6, 2015. Credit: nasa.gov




Credit: nasa.gov

“Look again at that dot. That's here. That's home. That's us. On it everyone you love, everyone you know, everyone you ever heard of, every human being who ever was, lived out their lives. The aggregate of our joy and suffering, thousands of confident religions, ideologies, and economic doctrines, every hunter and forager, every hero and coward, every creator and destroyer of civilization, every king and peasant, every young couple in love, every mother and father, hopeful child, inventor and explorer, every teacher of morals, every corrupt politician, every "superstar," every "supreme leader," every saint and sinner in the history of our species lived there-on a mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam.

The Earth is a very small stage in a vast cosmic arena. Think of the endless cruelties visited by the inhabitants of one corner of this pixel on the scarcely distinguishable inhabitants of some other corner, how frequent their misunderstandings, how eager they are to kill one another, how fervent their hatreds. Think of the rivers of blood spilled by all those generals and emperors so that, in glory and triumph, they could become the momentary masters of a fraction of a dot.

Our posturings, our imagined self-importance, the delusion that we have some privileged position in the Universe, are challenged by this point of pale light. Our planet is a lonely speck in the great enveloping cosmic dark. In our obscurity, in all this vastness, there is no hint that help will come from elsewhere to save us from ourselves.

The Earth is the only world known so far to harbor life. There is nowhere else, at least in the near future, to which our species could migrate. Visit, yes. Settle, not yet. Like it or not, for the moment the Earth is where we make our stand.

It has been said that astronomy is a humbling and character-building experience. There is perhaps no better demonstration of the folly of human conceits than this distant image of our tiny world. To me, it underscores our responsibility to deal more kindly with one another, and to preserve and cherish the pale blue dot, the only home we've ever known.”

― Carl Sagan, Pale Blue Dot   :)

Offline DSJ™

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Re: The Official Space Exploration Thread
« Reply #1162 on: July 20, 2015, 11:25 PM »
46 years ago, I remember well.  8)

"That's one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind" or however he was quoted...  :P



Offline BillCable

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Offline DSJ™

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Re: The Official Space Exploration Thread
« Reply #1164 on: August 1, 2015, 02:55 AM »
Shot of the Blue Moon I took tonite.


Offline DSJ™

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Re: The Official Space Exploration Thread
« Reply #1165 on: August 21, 2015, 02:53 PM »
What a picture, clicky link & click the pic for a high-rez pic.  8)

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Offline Jeff

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Re: The Official Space Exploration Thread
« Reply #1166 on: September 27, 2015, 11:54 PM »
For Dale -
SuperBloodMoonMagic from my deck - taken with my Nikon D5000, tripod, and 55-200mm lens.

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Offline Morgbug

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Re: The Official Space Exploration Thread
« Reply #1167 on: September 28, 2015, 01:08 AM »
Great shot!
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Offline Diddly

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Re: The Official Space Exploration Thread
« Reply #1168 on: September 28, 2015, 09:15 AM »
Too cloudy to see it here.  :(
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Offline DSJ™

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Re: The Official Space Exploration Thread
« Reply #1169 on: September 28, 2015, 10:38 AM »
Very nice shot you got there Jeff.   8)
We were lucky & had clear skies but a tad cold out here in Hoth. My pic from the front yard.



This amazing picture popped up on my Facebook feed... wow!



"After spending 5 hours on a rooftop with an incredible view of Dallas, I was able to create this composite image showing the moons transition from full moon, to full lunar eclipse, and back. Each moon image was shot approximately 10 minutes apart to capture the entire transition." by Mike Mezeul


In other news:

Mars 'major science finding' to be announced by NASA