CAPE CANAVERAL, FLA. — A mysterious object temporarily orbiting Earth is a 54-year-old rocket, not an asteroid after all, astronomers confirmed Wednesday.
Observations by a telescope in Hawaii clinched its identity, according to NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California.
The object was classified as an asteroid after its discovery in September. But NASA's top asteroid expert, Paul Chodas, quickly suspected it was the Centaur upper rocket stage from Surveyor 2, a failed 1966 moon-landing mission. Size estimates had put it in the range of the old Centaur, which was about 32 feet (10 meters) long and 10 feet (3 meters) in diameter.
While you're here, how about this:
NASA's Artemis I orbiting the moon
Orion, with its safe, tried and true design, passes the iconic vehicle assembly building at Cape Canaveral Air Force Base on November 11, 2014. Via picture Tampa Bay Times .
Artemis I. This is the first in a series of unprecedented NASA passengers, currently scheduled to launch from the agency in November 2021. Kennedy Space Center In Cape Canaveral, Florida. It will serve as an unopened aerial test in preparation for Artemis III, which is set to launch mankind’s next command and first woman to the moon in 2024.
Astronauts have snuck alcohol into space in hollowed-out books and pouches in their spacesuits |
Drinking alcohol is prohibited in space but that hasn't stopped some intrepid crew members from smuggling hooch into orbit.
Russian cosmonauts have admitted they've smuggled bottles of cognac in their space suits, in intentionally mislabeled 'juice' bottles and even inside hollowed-out books.
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Some Russian astronauts have also gone on crash diets before blastoff so they can sneak a bottle into their spacesuit without exceeding weight requirements.
Managing your expectations for the "Christmas Star" on the winter solstice December 21 -
The 2020 "Christmas Star" will be a great conjunction of Jupiter and Saturn on Dec. 21, when, from our view on Earth, the two planets will appear at their closest in centuries. A planetary conjunction may also have been the source of the Biblical Christmas star, a steel version of which shines nightly from South Mountain over Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, here wedged between the two gas giants in a composite image. Image credits: NASA; Saed Hindash | For lehighvalleylive.com
No argument. The great conjunction of Saturn and Jupiter, 2 of the brightest objects in the night-sky, on Monday, December 21, that has been labeled the "Christmas Star" is a special event. It will be the closest they've come since 1623 and they won't be so extra-close again until March 15, 2080.
This may worth something:
Direct image of newly discovered brown dwarf captured
Named HD 33632 Ab, the brown dwarf is one of only a few known objects of its kind orbiting a near-twin of the sun at near-twin scales of our solar system (Mercury to Pluto).
The study recently published in the November 30, 2020 issue of The Astrophysical Journal Letters .
Brown dwarfs are a class of objects that are smaller than stars but more massive than giant planets like Jupiter. They're dubbed 'failed stars' because they're not massive enough to ignite nuclear fusion in their cores and shine like true stars.
NASA, Boeing targeting March 2021 for next Starliner test flight | Space
Boeing's CST-100 Starliner capsule will launch toward the International Space Station (ISS) in March 2021, if all goes according to plan.
A post-flight investigation of OFT-1 revealed several problems with the capsule's software . But the Starliner team has been working through those issues and is now formally qualifying the flight software ahead of OFT-2.
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"NASA and Boeing are doing a tremendous amount of work on all aspects of their flight software, running numerous cases through the Boeing high-fidelity simulation environment that includes the Starliner avionics," Steve Stich, manager of NASA’s Commercial Crew Program, said in a statement on Wednesday.
Watch: 25 years of the sun | Space | EarthSky
This video, merging more than 2 decades of footage from SOHO cameras, captures thousands of sunspots, flares, and coronal mass ejections breaking out from the sun.
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SOHO moves around the sun in step with the Earth, by slowly orbiting around what’s called L1 , the first Lagrangian point, a position in space about a million miles (1.6 million km) from Earth, where the combined gravity of the Earth and sun keep SOHO in an orbit locked to the Earth-sun line.
Royal Mint's commemorative David Bowie coin orbits Earth | People | tulsaworld.com
A commemorative coin created in honour of late music legend David Bowie has been launched into space.
A silver coin, which is up for grabs in a competition on their official Facebook page, orbited the Earth's atmosphere for 45 minutes.
The coin features the iconic lightning bolt painted on Bowie's face for the artwork for his seminal album, 'Aladdin Slane', and is in honour of the beloved track 'Space Oddity'.
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Clare Maclennan, divisional director of commemorative coin at the Royal Mint, said: "We are thrilled to unveil the third coin in the Royal Mint's music legends series, honouring the intergalactic legacy and career of David Bowie.
Happening on Twitter
What secrets lurk below the clouds of Jupiter? New data from @NASAJuno is helping solve a 25-year-old mystery >>… https://t.co/podpdTOZDZ NASA_Marshall (from Huntsville, Alabama USA) Mon Dec 14 22:55:06 +0000 2020
A planet in an unlikely orbit around a double star 336 light-years away may offer a clue to a mystery much closer t… https://t.co/iaqiPWxvPK NASAHubble (from Goddard Space Flight Center) Thu Dec 10 16:03:19 +0000 2020
💨 Weather report from Jupiter: Data from our #JunoMission suggest that the giant planet's "hot spots" are much wide… https://t.co/ey51N0bnpC NASASolarSystem (from Milky Way Galaxy) Fri Dec 11 18:05:21 +0000 2020
In 2016, citizen scientists discovered a stunning yet strange aurora-like phenomenon dubbed STEVE, for Strong Therm… https://t.co/BpIkrQz2RA NASAhistory (from Washington, DC) Thu Dec 10 00:36:01 +0000 2020
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