Space In General

I saw this a couple of days ago somewhere, if you want something to give a sense of scale to that little bitty rocket thing you see dropping down and landing. I think it was captioned, "Space-X brings condos down and lands them," or something like that.

FYvrC.jpg
 
Elon Musk tweeted this while ago when someone said something about adding something to show the scale.



(I recommend reading the thread. It's kinda funny)


Hate how it was turned into a negative by some web journalist, probably a non-fan of the man in charge. I thought it was funny banter, because you could easily find many to scale references for the Falcon if those people knew how to use the rest of the net as well as they do twitter.
 
An interesting and ample article:
New evidence that all stars are born in pairs

excerpt
As astronomers look at younger and younger stars, they find a greater proportion of binaries, but why is still a mystery.

and

excerpt (emphasis mine)
They concluded that the only way to explain the observations is to assume that all stars of masses around that of the sun start off as wide Class 0 binaries in egg-shaped dense cores, after which some 60 percent split up over time. The rest shrink to form tight binaries.
 
Hmmm, NASA physicist recommending UFOCapture software for photographing jellyfish saucers over Europe. :lol:

JELLYFISH SPRITES OVER EUROPE: On June 20th, a thunderstorm in Austria unleashed a spectacular display of lightning. Observers on the ground witnessed blinding flashes of crackling light. The most amazing aspect of the outburst, however, was to be found high above the clouds. 80 km high, to be exact, in the realm of the sprites:



Martin Popek photographed the display from his private observatory in Nýdek, Czechia, more than 500 km away from the storm. Such distances are ideal for seeing above the tops of towering thunderclouds: diagram.

"Jellyfish sprite events like these are produced by very impulsive cloud-to-ground lightning flashes draining positive charge from the stratiform rain region in large thunderstorms," explains lightning scientist Oscar van der Velde of the Technical University of Catalonia, Spain. Somehow, in a process that researchers only partially understand, the resulting electric fields drew these sprites up toward the edge of space.

The tops of the sprites were surrounded by a saucer-like halo of red light, notes van der Velde. "The halo is evidence of intense electric fields at 80-90 km shaking up the electrons (colliding with nitrogen to produce light) for such a short time that sprite streamers cannot form. At lower altitudes the field exists longer, allowing the jellyfish sprite streamers to grow from electron avalanches."

Although sprites have been seen for at least a century, most scientists did not believe they existed until after 1989 when sprites were photographed by cameras onboard the space shuttle. Now "sprite chasers" routinely photograph sprites from their own homes. "I used up a Watec 910HX security camera with UFOCapturesoftware to catch my sprites," says Popek. Give it a try!

^from today's edition of spaceweather.com
 
Cosmic radiation detected over New England has increased an astonishing 19% over the last two years. Why? It's not because the source of these rays, exploding stars, is increasing. It's because the magnetic fields of the Sun and the Earth are seriously weakening. There may be interesting, even serious effects down the pipeline for us all if this trend persists.

From spaceweather.com comes the report:

NEW ATMOSPHERIC RADIATION RESULTS:
For the past two+ years, Spaceweather.com and the students of Earth to Sky Calculus have been monitoring cosmic rays in the atmosphere above California using high-altitude space weather balloons. After more than 100 flights, they find that dose rates have increased over the Golden State by 13% since March 2015.

Now we know the same thing is happening over New England--only more so.



The Earth to Sky team has flown balloons over Maine and New Hampshire four times since 2015, most recently on June 15, 2017. Although the data are relatively sparse compared to the better-sampled west coast, the results are clear. Radiation in the stratosphere over the northeastern corner of the USA is not only stronger than California, but also intensifying much faster--a 19% increase in New England vs. 13% in California.

What's happening? Generally speaking, cosmic rays are increasing throughout the entire solar system. This is because of the sunspot cycle. The sun is currently plunging toward a deep Solar Minimum. As it descends, the sun's weakening magnetic field and flagging solar wind provides less and less shielding against high-energy particles from deep space. Every planet in the Solar System is getting an extra dose.

The difference we see between California and New England is telling us something local about Earth. After the sun's magnetosphere deflects many cosmic rays, Earth's magnetic field and atmosphere provide another line of defense. Our data show that central California is better defended by geomagnetism than New England.

Cosmic rays penetrate commercial airlines, dosing passengers and flight crews enough that pilots are classified as occupational radiation workers. Some research shows that cosmic rays can seed clouds and trigger lightning, potentially altering weather and climate. Furthermore, there are studies ( #1, #2, #3, #4) linking cosmic rays with cardiac arrhythmias in the general population.
 
Martian anomaly #9,003.

Mars-UFO-982475.jpg
NASA

The full Curiosity rover image showing the anomaly.

Mars-UFO-821835.jpg
NASA

The object which looks strikingly out of place on Mars.
 
Martian anomaly #9,003.

Mars-UFO-982475.jpg
NASA

The full Curiosity rover image showing the anomaly.

Mars-UFO-821835.jpg
NASA

The object which looks strikingly out of place on Mars.
I believe Kaz sent that probe up there to laser scan Mars for GTS. Still a track or two to be revealed so.....
 
Martian anomaly #9,003.

Mars-UFO-982475.jpg
NASA

The full Curiosity rover image showing the anomaly.

Mars-UFO-821835.jpg
NASA

The object which looks strikingly out of place on Mars.

At first I thought it was a picture of a boat. Then the zoom in made me think "Obi Wan was there looking for Luke"
 
What's the size of the object? Inches wide, or miles wide?

To judge by comparison to the rover tracks (if that's what those tracks are) in the foreground of the upper photo, it would appear to be on the order of 100 inches to 300 inches?
 
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GEOMAGNETIC UNREST: Earth is entering a stream of solar wind flowing from a hole in the sun's atmosphere. This is causing geomagnetic unrest around the poles. High-latitude sky watchers should be alert for auroras on July 21st, especially in the southern hemisphere where winter darkness favors visibility. Free: Aurora Alerts

CME SWEEPS ASIDE COSMIC RAYS: On July 16th, a CME hit Earth's magnetic field, sparking two days of geomagnetic storms and beautiful southernauroras. The solar storm cloud also swept aside some of the cosmic rays currently surrounding Earth. Spaceweather.com and the students of Earth to Sky Calculus launched a space weather balloon to the stratosphere hours after the CME arrived. We detected a 7% decrease in X-rays and gamma-rays (two tracers of secondary cosmic rays). Neutron monitors in the Arctic and Antarctic recorded similar decrements. For instance, these data from the Bartol Research Institute show a nearly 8% drop in cosmic ray neutrons reaching the South Pole:



This is called a "Forbush Decrease," named after physicist Scott E. Forbush who first described it in the 20th century. Wherever CMEs go, cosmic rays are deflected by magnetic fields inside the solar storm clouds. As a result, when solar activity is high, cosmic radiation around Earth is relatively low--a yin-yang relationship that holds throughout all phases of the solar cycle.

Lately, cosmic rays around Earth have been intensifying as the solar cycle plunges toward minimum. The CME of July 16th reversed that trend--but only for a few days. Solar activity has returned to low levels and cosmic rays are on the rise again.

Why do we care about cosmic rays? For one thing, they penetrate commercial airlines, dosing passengers and flight crews so much that pilots are classified as occupational radiation workers. Some research shows that cosmic rays can seed clouds and trigger lightning, potentially altering weather and climate. Furthermore, there are studies ( #1, #2, #3, #4) linking cosmic rays with cardiac arrhythmias in the general population.

^from today's edition of spaceweather.com
 

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