The Cosmic Mirrorof News events across the Universe |
Compiled and written by Daniel Fischer, Skyweek - older "Mirrors" in the Archive - and find out what the future might bring! The latest issue! |
Current mission news: MGS (latest pictures!) + Cassini + Galileo + Prospector |
Columbia up in 3rd try; Chandra deployed!NASA has a new 'Great Observatory' in orbit! After the space shuttle Columbia finally made it into space in the 3rd attempt, at 4:31 UTC on July 23rd, everything went according to schedule - despite the surprising fact that the orbit was 11 km lower than planned after the main engines ran out of liquid oxygen several seconds early. And exactly in time at 11:47 UTC the Chandra spacecraft and its IUS upper stage were deployed, the IUS fired twice and was jettisoned. Over the next couple of days Chandra will use its own engines to get into the final elliptical orbit that should permit 55 continuous hours of observing.While the 2nd launch attempt on July 22nd had been missed due to an isolated thunderstorm in the wrong spot, the scrub on July 20th had been more dramatic. A faulty sensor sending out an alarm about high levels of hydrogen in the aft engine compartment of the space shuttle Columbia had forced a manual stop of the countdown just 7 seconds before takeoff (and less than 1 second before the main engines would have ignited). When the alarm rang, the "external ignitors," a hydrogen removal system, were already running: They needed to be replaced for the next launch attempt, forcing a 48 hr wait. Had the main engines started firing, an ever longer delay would have been necessary. Chandra is the third in NASA's family of 'Great Observatories.' Complementing the Hubble Space Telescope and the Compton Gamma Ray Observatory, which are already in Earth orbit, the Chandra X-Ray Observatory will study X-Rays to learn more about black holes, to study quasars at the edge of the observable universe, and even to analyze comets in our own solar system. By mapping the location of X-Ray energy throughout the universe, one might also find clues to the identity of the 'missing mass'. The resolution and sensitivity of Chandra's large telescope in combination with its two science instruments should surpass all previous X-ray satellites by an order of magnitude - and such a jump in astronomy tends to lead to spectacular discoveries... |
Homepages of Chandra from NASA, Harvard, NASA Science. STS-93 Press Kit. Hot Updates of the mission STS-93 and the Chandra Newsroom. Background from NASA: an interview, observing targets and why Chandra was launched at night. Meanwhile ESA reminds us of the December launch of XMM. Checking for troubles in Columbia: CNN, CBS. Waiting for Chandra's science: Space.com. The deployment: News coverage from CNN, BBC, ABC, Space.com, SpaceViews. The launch: News coverage from CNN (the event, Eileen Collins), SpaceViews, Space Daily, Space.com. The July 22 scrub: News coverage from CNN, SpaceViews. The July 20 scrub: Shuttle status and news coverage from CNN, BBC, ABC, Space.com, Explore Zone, SpaceViews. Pre-launch coverage from ABC, BBC, Fla. Today, SpaceViews. The other astronomy experiment on STS-93: SWUIS! The Homepage, Press Kit page, Press Release. |
Liberty Bell 7 recovered!On the 30th anniversary of the 1st Moon Walk, another piece of history has 'resurfaced': Gus Grissom's space capsule Liberty Bell 7 has been brought up from the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean early on July 20th, 2 1/2 months after a submarine had first located it (see Update # 128, last story). An effort then to raise the capsule had failed when rough seas snapped the cable linking the sub to the surface ship, stranding the sub on the ocean floor.The same team had returned in July with a newly-designed robot sub, named Ocean Discovery, designed to retrieve both the first sub as well as the Liberty Bell capsule. Navigational problems kept the team from retrieving the sub, but after a series of technical problems with Ocean Discovery were resolved, it reached the capsule on July 19. After attaching a harness, the robot returned to the surface, spooling a line of Kevlar cable linking the capsule with the recovery ship - then the the ship slowly winched the capsule up. Early on July 21st - to the day 38 years after it had sunk - Liberty Bell 7 was back on dry land, in Florida's Port Canaveral. |
Daily dispatches from the recovery operation. Hooked! - Recovery! - Journey's End. News coverage from BBC, ABC, MSNBC, Space.com, SpaceViews. |
Subaru finds first extraterrestrial ethane ice on PlutoThe new Japanese Subaru Telescope has observed the most distant planet with its Cooled Infrared Spectrograph / Camera (CISCO) last month, obtaining excellent images that clearly separated the planet Pluto from its satellite Charon just 0.9 arcseconds away. Subaru then used CISCO to gather some of the most revealing spectra ever obtained for both Pluto and Charon. Initial analysis of the data confirms that the surface compositions for these two bodies are strikingly different: Pluto is covered in frozen nitrogen, methane, carbon monoxide and newly discovered ethane "ice" (all at a temperature colder than -210 degrees C); Charon appears mostly covered in the more familiar water ice (also at an extremely cold temperature). The detection of ethane is particularly significant, as this material may be a remnant of the original interstellar gas cloud that collapsed to form our solar system 4.5 billion years ago, preserved over the eons by the extreme cold out at the distance of Pluto's orbit. |
Subaru Press Release with pictures & spectra. News coverage from the BBC. |
"Richter scale" for asteroids proposedAn MIT professor has come up with a scale that assigns a number to the likelihood that an asteroid will collide with the Earth. Zero or one means virtually no chance of impact or damage; 10 means certain catastrophe. The risk-assessment system by Richard Binzel - who had proposed a simpler scale in 1995 - is similar to the Richter scale used for earthquakes. It is named the Torino Impact Hazard Scale for the Italian city in which it was adopted at a workshop of the International Astronomical Union (IAU) in June.Based on the orbit trajectory for a given NEO, the scale takes into account the object's size and speed as well as the probability that it will come into contact with the Earth. The scale can be used at different levels of complexity by scientists, science journalists and the general public. It assigns a number from zero through 10 to a predicted close encounter by an NEO. A zero means that the object has virtually no chance of colliding with the Earth or that the object is so small it would disintegrate into harmless bits if it passed through the Earth's atmosphere. A 10 means that the object will definitely hit the Earth and have the capability to cause a "global climatic catastrophe." |
The Torino Scale. MIT, NASA Science Press Releases, alternate version. Discussion of the Torino scale at CCNet on July 22nd and 23rd. News coverage by BBC, MSNBC, SpaceViews, Space.com. Somewhat related story: The fastest rotating object in the solar system is asteroid 1998 KY26 with a 11 minute day: JPL Press Release, ABC, MSNBC, Space.com, SpaceViews stories. |
FUSE Satellite Tracks First Star ImagesOn July 18, 1999, the Far Ultraviolet Spectroscopic Explorer (FUSE; see Update # 137) successfully acquired and tracked its first star image as part of the initial calibration testing using the Instrument Data System (IDS) that controls instrument functions. The IDS acquired an image of a star field from the instrument's Fine Error Sensor, identified specific stars in the image, and began controlling the satellite attitude using those stars as a reference. The first picture was a one-second exposure of a star field in the constellation Pavo. It shows many stars and extended objects that are distant galaxies. The IDS flight software allows the satellite to achieve and hold a pointing accuracy of 0.5 arcseconds: This high-accuracy pointing will be required to collect the FUSE mission science data. |
Press Release on the 1st image, more on the same, and an earlier Press Release. FUSE Homepage and what the mission is all about. The current Mission Status. |
Progress docks with MirThe - perhaps last-ever - supply ship sent to the Russian space station has arrived safely on July 18th. The most precious cargo: new control electronics to enable a controlled reentry of the station. Florida Today, ABC, SpaceViews.Cosmonauts Complete Unsuccessful Spacewalk: Two Russian cosmonauts completed a frustrating six-hour spacewalk outside the Mir space station July 23rd during which they failed to deploy an antenna or find a leak in the station's hull: SpaceViews, BBC, ABC. An Israeli astronaut gets to fly on the shuttle: That was announced during the visit by Prime Minister Ehud Barak in the U.S. - SpaceViews. The art of predicting the sunspot cycleis discussed in a NASA Science News item: A maximum of 154 +/- 20 is now expected.Lunar bits & pieces...
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A big batch of new MGS imageswas released in conjunction with a major Mars conference and to celebrate various space anniversaries: pictures, announcement, stories from SpaceViews, CNN, MSNBC.Europe and Japan will collaborate on Mars missions, making use of the simultaneous Nozomi & Mars Express arrivals: ESA Science News. Eros would be pretty valuableThat's what NEAR's data reveal: BBC story. Deep Space 1 closes in on 1992 KD: the July 18 mission log. SpaceDev sells a ride to Nereus: Press Release. And the next NASA sample return mission after Apollo 17 is ... Genesis: CNN story.
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Compiled and written by Daniel Fischer
