Iâm legit curious if SpaceX will rack up more successful launches this year than all other medium or heavy launch operators combined. It seems possible.
Did anyone launch and crash a rocket into the Moon? Possibly while high? Cypress Hill, Iâm looking in your directionâŚ
Other suspects include Hugo Drax, Lens Larque, and Chairface Chippendale.
UNFAIR! CC uses lasers, he has no ships.
Of course itâs China or Russia.
Or us. Thereâs no dark conspiracy here. The reason nobody is claiming credit for an old expended rocket impacting the moon is because nobody really cares. Not enough to do all the legwork to figure it out. Another crater on a moon full of them? No big deal. Thereâs a reason that all the sources quoted there are amateur astronomers.
I dunno, I still think leaving any sign of yourself on the moon, even if itâs trash or the byproduct of a much earlier and possibly failed mission, is noteworthy if not commendable. The expression âAim for the Moon; even if you miss, youâll land among the starsâ indicates that it is still a tremendous endeavor. First youâd have to claw your way out of the Earthâs gravity well, then be able to navigate a distance covering a space large enough to fit all the other planets in our solar system.
So at worst, itâs like finding a plastic bag at the bottom of the Mariana Trench â a lot of effort and technical achievement went in to leaving that human-created pollution there. At best, itâs like a kid cracking a baseball, sending it out of the outfield through a neighborâs window. Itâs a mess, but you kinda have to respect the power involved.
Matt_W
5203
Was up in the Sierra Nevada at 8000â the other night stargazing from my campsite. Noticed a satellite going overhead, then another followed, then another, then another. Total about a dozen in a line evenly spaced 3-4 full-moon-widths apart. Starlink? They were dim enough that I wouldnât have been able to see them from a city, but kind of weird to see what looked like a train cross the night sky.
I donât know of anything but Starlink satellites that would be in a train like that.
JMR
5206
NASA said it plans to release several images beginning at 10:30 am ET (14:30 UTC) on July 12, the result of Webbâs âfirst lightâ observations. On Wednesday, space agency officials said the images and other data would include the deepest-field image of the universe ever takenâlooking further into the cosmos than humans ever have beforeâas well as the spectrum of an atmosphere around an exoplanet. By looking in the infrared, Webb will be able to identify the fingerprints of small molecules, such as carbon dioxide and ozone, that will offer meaningful clues about the habitability of worlds around other stars.
Oh man I canât wait to see these images.
Yeah, the only other groups of satellites which launch at all similarly will generally release between one at a time to a few at a time from a primary deployer, and most are launched in smaller groups than that or are too small to see (cubesats).
Iâd guess it would have to be this launch from June 17th just based on timing alone (the prior one was a month before and wouldnât look like that): Starlink Group 4-19 | Falcon 9 Block 5 | Everyday Astronaut
Starlink currently releases 53 all at once at a semi-lowered altitude which split into multiple streams and travel to different orbital planes (apparently 3 planes from this launch) as they raise in altitude. They start out all together as a long blob visible in the sky, spread out into these long chains getting farther and farther apart, then after not too long a time (maybe a few days?) are spread out enough that only one from the same launch is visible to a single ground observer at once. The goal is generally that one orbital planeâs chain of satellites will make a circle fully around the globe before it reaches its final altitude.
Awesome. Canât wait to see them!
Here it is folks! Teaser of the first full production image:
Webbâs Fine Guidance Sensor Provides a Preview
We are less than one week away from the release of the first full-color images from NASAâs James Webb Space Telescope, but how does the observatory find and lock onto its targets? Webbâs Fine Guidance Sensor (FGS) â developed by the Canadian Space Agency â was designed with this particular question in mind. Recently it captured a view of stars and galaxies that provides a tantalizing glimpse at what the telescopeâs science instruments will reveal in the coming weeks, months, and years.
Cripes, thatâs just the targeting sensor!!?
JMR
5211
Pretty cool video showing the operational side of the jet as well as the science-y stuff.
This will also be the last year of operations for the flying observatory.
That was my exact thought too. I canât imagine how amazing that first real image is going go to look like. What still blows my mind is how many galaxies are in that image.
A new video about our Bennu visit thatâs mentioned up there ^
Scientists! think that Bennu is so loosely packed that OSIRIS-REx would have sunk into the asteroid if it had tried to land rather than doing a touch-and-go.
OSIRIS-REx is due to get back here with those Bennu samples toward the end of next year.
omg omg omg omg omg - canât wait :)
