MEANDERING IN SPACE

 

The largest meteor shower of this year is occurring now.  Above is an extraordinary photo of the Perseid meteor shower on 12August2021 by Josh Drury (right) over Stonehenge.  You also see our Milky Way.  The Perseids, associated with the Swift-Tuttle comet, started Monday morning and will continue for up to five nights. 

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  The best time to watch is near dawn before there is any kind of sunlight.  
• However, the best night was the first one, partly because of Moon conditions.  From all indications, not worth a bother watching the Perseids anymore this year.

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  These flaming particles burn up by the time they get as close as 50 miles from the Earth's surface.
• Note that this comet has a 133-year orbit, and what you see is the leftover particles from previous visits.
• John Denver's song Rocky Mountain High makes reference to this shower.

Almost all meteor showers are associated with a passing comet or asteroid, and some are named after them.  

• However, the identification of the event is mostly linked to the portion of the sky from where the flow seems to originate.  Thus, these showers tend to be called after a constellation or star, like the Perseid meteor shower for the constellation Perseus.  
• Particles have been known to crash.  It is then called a meteorite.

The great Leonid meteor shower of 12November1833 (above) had hundreds of thousands meteors that night, and was seen all over North America.  The Leonids in 1867 might have reached 1000 meteors/hour.

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  In comparison, the Perseids provide maybe around 60 meteors/hour.
• The first reported observation was about 69 BC, and strong ones recur every third of a century.

• Annual activity varies quite a bit.  
• There was nothing in 1899.
• Then up to 3,000/hour in 1999, 2001 and 2002.
• The full moon washed the 17November2012 shower.
• A modest 15-20/hour is predicted for the upcoming 17November2025 shower.

  

• Up to 400/hour predicted for 2033 and 500/hour for 2034.
• Anywhere from 50/hour to 5100/hour in 2061.
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  The song, Stars Fell on Alabama, a 1934 jazz standard by Frank Perkins and Mitchell Parish, refers to a spectacular occurrence of the Leonid meteor shower observed in Alabama on November of 1899.

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  The Leonid meteor shower is more magnificent than the Perseids, and is so-called because it seems to radiate from the star Gamma Leonis, also called Algieba.  However most years the Leonids don't even show up, and many years are minimal.
• Associated with the comet Tempel-Tuttle.  Same Horace Parnell Tuttle of that Perseid comet.  HP found 15 comets.

The James Webb Space Telescope took 25 years from conception to reach space, costing over $10 billion, about the price of the World War II Manhattan Project in 2024 dollars.  

• James Webb was the Administrator of NASA from the beginning of the Kennedy White House through the end of Johnson's.
• The Space Telescope was launched on Christmas day of 2021 and sent the first image on 12July2022

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  The primary mirror is a little over 21 feet large and the sun-shield is about the size of a tennis court.   

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  Can look only a 100 million years after the Big Bang, which occurred 13.7 billion years ago.  

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  Collects six times the light of the Hubble Telescope.  
• Located almost a million miles from Earth at the L2, or second Lagrange point.
• Mission includes extrasolar planets and contribution to the discovery of dark matter and dark energy.

• The first photo (above) was sent on 12July2024.  Watch this video.  There are 25,000 galaxies in this graphic.  Our Milky Way Galaxy alone is so large that light takes more than 100,000 years to go from one end to the other.  The largest known galaxy is IC 1101.  Light takes 4 million light years to travel across this galaxy.  
  
• Except that it is more and more appearing that our galaxy could well be double the diameter.  Such is the nature space science these days.

• In June of 2023, the Space Telescope sent planet Saturn, with rings and three moons.

• NGC 5194, also known as Messier 51a or the Whirlpool Galaxy, which is "only" 77 light years in diameter and 23.5 million light years away.

• Earlier this summer, the following was sent of the Serpens Nebula.  It is 1300 light-years away.  A nebula is a cloud of dust and gas in space, and the Serpens Nebula is home to a dense cluster of newly forming stars.

Trapped in space?  What is the status of astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams, who are now stranded on the International Space Station?

• Planning for an eight-day visit, Wilmore and Williams departed on the Boeing Starliner from Cape Canaveral on June 5.
• But the spacecraft had problems, and five of their 28 thrusters unexpectedly shut down.  Then helium leaks were found.

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  There are others also on the ICS, which makes 16 orbits of Earth daily.  They put on their own version of the Olympic Games.

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  Anyway, early on, there was an announcement of a slight delay.  No problem, for NASA reported that the Starliner can spend up to 45 days docked to the ISS.
• Well, has been 70 days and counting now.
• Boeing has recently had Trump-like luck, with that 737 MAX losing a window and two of these commercial jets crashing in 2018 and 2019, killing more than 300.  Their stock value has halved from five years ago. 
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  The Starliner project:
• Unveiled in 2010 as Boeing's first space capsule, where the company accepted the financial risk for development, and the loss has been more than $1.5 billion.
• Is a reusable spacecraft.
• Boeing was selected over SpaceX in 2014 on a $4.2 billion contract to certify the Starliner by 2017.  
• The hope was to fly NASA astronauts by end of 2018.
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  There was a failure of the first uncrewed orbital flight in 2021.
• Mid-2023 was settled as the period for the first flight to the ISS.
• Finally left with these two astronauts on 5June2024.
• The next flight is supposed to occur in late 2025.

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  In short, on August 7 NASA reported that Williams' and Wilmore's short stay may be delayed until February of next year.
• The current plan is to fly the Starliner back to Earth empty.
• Then flight #2 would have two astronauts with two empty seats to bring back the stranded two.
• The ISS only sleeps six, but there are now eight of them there.

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  Astronauts do not do laundry in space, but just dispose of them.  However, a Cygnus resupply vehicle did just arrive, carrying 8,200 pounds of equipment and food, including fresh clothes.

Frankly, I see no value today of going to Mars, but Elon Musk is committed, and he has the money to try to do so, for I can only wish him well.  Actually, he would be doing Humanity a greater favor by focusing on the Blue Revolution, but any supporter of Donald Trump has issues, so good luck Elon.  But the good news for him is that Mars might well have immense reservoirs of liquid water, as reported by NASA's robotic InSight lander.  Yet, NASA has this reputation for insinuating outrageous exaggerations (I know, I once worked for them) when budget matters need to be influenced in Congress.

In 2016, the estimate was that the first human mission to Mars would cost half a trillion dollars.  Around that time NASA had $1.5 trillion as their figure.  Business Insider has figures as high as $10 trillion today.  And why?  Someday, for sure, but maybe in a century or two or more when it might becomes absolutely necessary.  For now, let's cure global warming for our 8 billion population, which could cost $50 trillion.

Latest hot flash!  Watch this.  NASA WILL TODAY ANNOUNCE WHEN THE TWO ASTRONAUTS WILL RETURN HOME.

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