Astronomy and Space

[tenchboy]

Got a western facing window? Have need to be 'just getting up' in the night? Combine the two, have a peep out to the west around 3 or 4am if you're up and about.
Venus as a morning star* just now is absolutely stunning; shining bright like a miniature moon; no wonder, as Lucifer the light-bringer, it played such a part in the communual psychey in days gone by. It is a major object in the sky and much over-looked: it is nothing short of awesome! Pre-light-polution or out on the moors it must have been utterly magnificent.
I would imagine also - in fact I'm certain, that if you marked its position above the horizon just at sun rise - by so many fingers' width at arms-length - that you would be able to spot it during the day the same distance ahead of the sun.
Lots of cool points on offer there!

Ahem, - east facing window for morning planets
Jupiter and Saturn are good in the west in the evening though.

How strange. Ta.

[Gfamily]

There's a possible announcement tomorrow of a suggestion of evidence for life on Venus

An article on EarthSky.org that seems to have jumped the gun on an embargo date, then removed, but was Google Cached,

ETA - almost did an LPM on that one...

https://webcache.googleusercontent.com/ ... Oo2mS-amoI

[basementer]

There's a possible announcement tomorrow of a suggestion of evidence for life on Venus

An article on EarthSky.org that seems to have jumped the gun on an embargo date, then removed, but was Google Cached,

ETA - almost did an LPM on that one...

https://webcache.googleusercontent.com/ ... Oo2mS-amoI

I remember when there was discussion of what might have been microbial remnants on a bit of Mars rock, mid to late 1990s, Terry Pratchett said something close to "I want so much for this to be true that I hope the scientists are trying their hardest to prove that it isn't". I couldn't have phrased it better.

[shpalman]

Well I did find Phosphine Detected In The Atmosphere of Venus

It wouldn't be such a good sign if phosphine were detected in the atmosphere of my lab.

[basementer]

Night Sky Tube map:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1V9k3N_lZYI

[jimbob]

Ah well, it looks as though the paper about the black hole at the centre of the Earth has been retracted now:

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/31850126/

[Gfamily]

This probably has more information about Space Mission Operating Systems than you need, but it is an interesting read.
https://arstechnica.com/features/2020/1 ... ne-before/

[shpalman]

Oh god they gave half the physics Nobel to Penrose.

[dyqik]

Oh god they gave half the physics Nobel to Penrose.

When did he do physics?

[Gfamily]

Early tomorrow evening, if it's clear, you can put extend your arm and your fist can cover over 79% of all the moons in the Solar System.

Spoiler:

Moonpocalypse.png (14.33 KiB) Viewed 18133 times

Jupiter has 79
Saturn has 82
Pluto has 5
plus our 1

Thanks to https://twitter.com/tony873004/status/1 ... 6149793793

[dyqik]

The Arecibo Telescope can't be repaired after it's last hurricane damage, and will now be decommissioned.

https://www.nsf.gov/news/news_summ.jsp?cntn_id=301674

[basementer]

The Arecibo Telescope can't be repaired after it's last hurricane damage, and will now be decommissioned.

https://www.nsf.gov/news/news_summ.jsp?cntn_id=301674

What a shame.

[tenchboy]

with a 900-ton instrument platform hanging 450 feet above

900 tons! that's 30 centurion tanks worth!
(And wiki concurs)
In the pics it looks like two open girder cradles -some large stage lighting gantries- with the technical gubbinry hanging below, wouldn't have said it was more than ten tons.
Them's some cables and pylons!

[Gfamily]

The Arecibo Telescope can't be repaired after it's last hurricane damage, and will now be decommissioned.

https://www.nsf.gov/news/news_summ.jsp?cntn_id=301674

The entire 900tonne instrument platform has now collapsed through the dish

https://arstechnica.com/science/2020/12 ... collapsed/

Images
https://www.noticel.com/galeria/2020120 ... e-arecibo/

[Gfamily]

The Arecibo Telescope can't be repaired after it's last hurricane damage, and will now be decommissioned.

https://www.nsf.gov/news/news_summ.jsp?cntn_id=301674

The entire 900tonne instrument platform has now collapsed through the dish

Captured on video - static camera followed by a Drone that was inspecting the platform at the time.
https://twitter.com/i/status/1334540065201012737

[basementer]

The Arecibo Telescope can't be repaired after it's last hurricane damage, and will now be decommissioned.

https://www.nsf.gov/news/news_summ.jsp?cntn_id=301674

The entire 900tonne instrument platform has now collapsed through the dish

Captured on video - static camera followed by a Drone that was inspecting the platform at the time.
https://twitter.com/i/status/1334540065201012737

Someone in the comments had a similar thought to me - this is like having the Tacoma Narrows Bridge collapse caught on film, it's going to be studied for generations.

[dyqik]

The entire 900tonne instrument platform has now collapsed through the dish

Captured on video - static camera followed by a Drone that was inspecting the platform at the time.
https://twitter.com/i/status/1334540065201012737

Someone in the comments had a similar thought to me - this is like having the Tacoma Narrows Bridge collapse caught on film, it's going to be studied for generations.

Hmm, I don't think this has anything like the same impact. The Tacoma Narrows bridge was a somewhat unforeseen risk that engineers missed, while this is pretty much what engineers predicted, and why the decision was made to not to attempt to repair the telescope.

[basementer]

Both of them document the sequence in which components successively fail. It's not the sort of experiment that one can ethically carry out at this scale so having footage of the collapse is going to be valuable.

[dyqik]

Both of them document the sequence in which components successively fail. It's not the sort of experiment that one can ethically carry out at this scale so having footage of the collapse is going to be valuable.

True, that's definitely useful. But I doubt this will make it into undergraduate physics lectures in the way that Tacoma Narrows illustrates driven resonant systems.

[bolo]

I knew a guy who was an engineer on the Tacoma Narrows Bridge. He worked on the design of the piers, which he proudly said were the only bit that didn't fall down. He was an interesting guy. MrsBolo and I met at his retirement party, in 1998, when he was 92. His family had fled Russia during the revolution, ending up in Shanghai. Then he came to the U.S. for university and had a long career here in civil engineering as an academic and consultant and ... some other stuff. Full of stories.

[Boustrophedon]

Video of the collapse including drone footage.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b3AASKr ... l=MDxmedia

[dyqik]

ISS footage of Hayabusa 2 asteroid sample return capsule reentering the atmosphere.

https://twitter.com/girlandkat/status/1 ... 45859?s=19

A helicopter is currently homing in on its beacon to recover it.

[basementer]

Both of them document the sequence in which components successively fail. It's not the sort of experiment that one can ethically carry out at this scale so having footage of the collapse is going to be valuable.

True, that's definitely useful. But I doubt this will make it into undergraduate physics lectures in the way that Tacoma Narrows illustrates driven resonant systems.

I concede. You have a point, and, if we eventually meet, a pint.

[lpm]

BOOM! Did it mean to do that at the end?

[Gfamily]

It's an X Space rocket