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By Daniel Fischer Every page present in Europe & the U.S.!
| Ahead | Awards 
The latest issue!
| A German companion! (SuW version) Current mission news: MGS (latest pictures!) + Cassini + Galileo + NEAR |
Aurora warning for September 14 after a halo event: SpaceRef; check SpaceWeather.com and ASTRONET! And watch out for the "Harvest Moon" tonight: Science@NASA, Space.com.
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Atlantis crew performs EVA, enters ISS, gets extra dayThe crew of Atlantis opened the doors to a spacious new home early on Sept. 12 and began the work of outfitting the interior of the International Space Station: The five astronauts and two cosmonauts opened the first hatch into a connecting tunnel at 2:40 UTC, proceeded smoothly through 10 more doorways and cracked the final hatch into a Russian cargo ship at 6:22 UTC. Crewmembers first floated into the new Zvezda service module wearing breathing filters and eye goggles as a precaution against possible atmospheric contamination and debris inside the newest module of the station. Within minutes the crew reported that air quality and other conditions inside Zvezda were excellent, removed the precautionary equipment and went to work.The day before the 6h 14m EVA to connect 9 cables between Zvezda and Zarya and to install a back-up navigation system has also gone along without a hitch, as had the docking procedure on Sept. 10th at 5:51 UTC. Since the mission is progressing so well, NASA has given the astronauts permission for one extra day of docked operations: The additional mission day - which delays the landing to 8:30 UTC on Sept. 20 - will give the crew more time to prepare the orbiting facility for the arrival of the first station crew when it docks to the station in early November. Electrical work was the hallmark of Sept. 13 as four of the mission specialists aboard Atlantis and the ISS replaced batteries inside the Zarya and Zvezda modules while supply transfer continued around them. Atlantis heads for the ISSSpace Shuttle Atlantis rocketed into space at 12:46 UTC on Sept. 8 and is on course to rendezvous and dock with the International Space Station at 5:52 UTC on Sept. 10. In preparation for that linkup, the crew spent Sept. 9 readying a variety of tools and equipment needed to support the rendezvous and docking, as well as equipment that will be used during Monday morning's scheduled space walk. With the assistance of crew mate Dan Burbank, spacewalkers Ed Lu and Yuri Malenchenko checked out the suits they will wear during their planned 6 � hour long space walk Monday. Burbank will act as the in-cabin choreographer for that EVA during which the astronauts will crawl along all of the space station and way out of the range of the shuttle's robotic arm - a first for NASA.Flight controllers have reported that one of Atlantis' two onboard star trackers is not operating properly and has been powered off. The star trackers can be used as one method of updating navigation information aboard Atlantis. The failure of the star tracker, a device located on the left side of Atlantis' nose that looks upward, will have no significant impact on the planned rendezvous and docking. The remaining star tracker can be used to perform the needed functions. Once docked the astronauts and cosmonauts will briefly open the hatch between Atlantis and the mating adapter on ISS to gather an air sample. The hatch will then be closed in preparation for the EVA. After it's over, the crew will open 12 hatches throughout the length of the 44-m long station and the attached Progress supply vehicle to begin transferring equipment and hardware. |
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Stardust's CCD chips stay dirtyAn effort to clean off contaminants from the CCD chip of the camera of the Stardust spacecraft on its way to comet Wild 2 has had only limited success: "The changes were not sufficient to resolve the filament in the Calibration Lamp that was turned on for all of the CCD heater test images," the Sept. 8 Status Report says: "The Calibration Lamp was still blurred and surrounded by scattered light. Therefore we have inconclusive results as to if and how much the camera performance was improved. It could be that we removed some coating on the CCD, but still may have additional coatings on the primary optics, mirror and periscope."Since no sufficient improvement to resolve the Calibration Lamp filament to quantify the changes resulting from the CCD heater test was obtained, star images will be taken Sept. 12 to see if there was improvement of the camera point spread response to point sources. If there is no or some improvement, additional heating sequences will be implemented, including turning on the mirror heater to work on potential coatings on the primary optics and mirror. Should the dirt persist, Stardust's images of Wild 2's nucleus would be compromised, but the primary task of the mission, bringing dust from its coma back to Earth, would not be affected. |
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Towards an understanding of Jupiter's "hotspots"Waves of up-and-down winds that span great ranges in air pressure may explain the surprisingly clear, dry areas near Jupiter's equator, new research based on data from NASA's Galileo entry probe indicates - scientists have been trying to understand the stability of these clear "hot spots" ever since the probe plunged into one of them nearly five years ago. Computer simulations now indicate that air moving west to east just north of Jupiter's equator is also moving dramatically up and down every few days. Water and ammonia vapors condense into clouds in Jupiter's white equatorial plumes as the vapors rise. Then the wrung-out air drops, forming the clear patches. After crossing those hot spots, the air rises again and returns to its normal cloudy state.During the Galileo probe's hour-long descent on Dec. 7, 1995, it had returned the only direct measurements ever made from within Jupiter's atmosphere. Scientists quickly realized the entry point was a special place: On a planet mostly wrapped in high clouds, the probe hit the southern rim of a clear spot where infrared radiant energy from the planet's interior shines through. The computer simulation reveals that the probe's entry site is probably even more unusual than previously thought. Both the probe and the computer model show that the head winds on the southern rim of a hot spot get stronger and stronger with depth into the planet. But in the model, this trend is reversed on the northern rim - a result underscoring the importance of future multi-probe missions to Jupiter. |
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Probable Beagle 2 landing site chosenIsidis Basin, one of NASA's highest priority landing sites on Mars, has become the prime choice for Europe's first attempt at a Mars landing, with a decision coming up in December: Space.com.Beagle scientist insults NASA's rovers! The scientist behind Europe's lander mission to Mars has launched an extraordinary attack on NASA and its twin rovers that will compete with Beagle for attention: BBC Online. Dust storms on Mars and Earth compared - on the Red Planet they have a more important role for the climate: PhotoJournal, MSSS Release. Regional Topographic Views of Mars from MOLA: PhotoJournal. A global image: PhotoJournal. New evidence that the Permian mass extinction was extremely abruptis being provided by the pattern in which rivers changed 250 Myr ago - that in turn reflects a very sudden loss of vegetation which, together with the long-known dramatic loss of animal life, indicates that this greatest disaster in the history of life on Earth (see also the sidebars of stories 5 and 6 of Update # 198) was an abrupt event (though not necessarily a cosmic one): Univ. of WA Press Release, Space.com.Did an impact bring about the Dark Ages 1500 yrs ago? This view of British neo-catastrophists has been promoted once more: Reuters and more articles plus some comments. More evidence that the Moon originated in a giant impact into the young Earth has come to light: Space.com. SOFIA completes Critical Design ReviewThe Stratospheric Observatory for Infrared Astronomy, or SOFIA, a joint effort between NASA and the German Aerospace Center, DLR, successfully completed its Critical Design Review (CDR) on August 17 - as a result of this major assessment, NASA's review board has provided a green light for proceeding into the fabrication and integration phase of the project, with the flying observatory becoming operational in 2002: Ames news release.Machu Picchu sundial damaged during beer commercial shootA beer commercial shoot that damaged a stone sundial in the famous Inca ruins of Machu Picchu has drawn harsh criticism from archaeologists and politicians: AP.John Dobson is 85 - for 3 decades on a single-minded mission to bring the wonders of the skies to earth, making them accessible to the everyday person: Space.com, a kind of Homepage and some bio. |
M 82's Central Engine highly variableChandra observations show that the 500-solar mass Central Engine of the galaxy M 82 has a quickly varying X-ray flux - this has been interpreted as evidence for a medium-size Black Hole: MSFC & Chandra Press Releases, BBC, CNN, Discovery, Space.com, Reuters, NYT, AP, RP, SPIEGEL. Black Hole 'demographics' based on 32 galaxies: paper by Merritt & Ferrarese. Another award for Chandra: TRW Press Release.A bow shock of a lonely neutron star that is travelling through interstellar space has been imaged with the VLT: ESO Press Release. The proper motion of the neutron star as measured with the HST: paper by Walter. Pulsar astrometry with the HST: papers by Mignami & al. and De Luca & al. "Earth Picture of the Day" launchedOn September 8, NASA and Universities Space Research Association (USRA) have launched a new web site, "Earth Science Picture of the Day" - each day the web site will feature a new Earth science image with a descriptive caption: EPOD, GSFC announcement.Another new website for NASA Earth images is Visible Earth. And don't forget the classical Astronomy Picture of the Day or APOD. IKONOS pictures of Olympic Park and other Sydney sites: Spacefl. Now. New SRTM data products: PIA0277... 0, 1, 2, 3, 4 (the latter esp. spectacular). And new Terra views: PIA0262... 0, 1, 2. How hurricane forecasts have improved since 100 years ago when Galveston, TX, was destroyed in the U.S.' worst natural disaster: GSFC Press Release. TRMM, QuikScat roles in hurricane monitoring: Science@NASA. Record-setting Ozone Hole - a NASA spectrometer has detected an Antarctic ozone depletion area three times larger than the entire land mass of the U.S., the largest such area ever observed: Science@NASA, BBC, SPIEGEL, APOD, Space.com, AP. How software for space science is helping crime fightersand soon everyone else to enhance blurry and shaky videos has been demonstrated by the VISAR system - it was developed initially for astronomy and weather monitoring, has now found an application in crime cases, and might soon become integrated into video editing systems and camcorders for everyone: Science@NASA.A new science center has opened in Bremen, Germany, with one section devoted to cosmology: Homepage, RP, SPIEGEL stories. And there is also a - temporary - exhibit in Berlin that includes some rare astronomical artefacts: "Seven Hills" Homepage, details about the whole exhibit, the space section and astronomy's big questions, plus reviews by SPIEGEL and WELT. |
All other historical issues can be found in the Archive.
The U.S. site of this Cosmic Mirror has been visited
since it was issued (the German site has no counter).
Compiled and written by Daniel Fischer
(send me a mail to [email protected]!), Skyweek
