Planets, Comets, Asteroids, etc.

[Foggy]

Is our planet an exoplanet?

Hoo boy, my autospell did NOT want to let me type that word. Exoplanet exoplanet exoplanet hahaha never let the computer win, that's my philosophy.

It tried to force me to type explanation instead. No, explanations don't revolve around stars.

[Kriselda Gray]

I thought that they had discovered several exoplanets. Is this one just the first "earthlike" planet?

I think it maybe is the first one confirmed visually? I know at least some of the rest have been inferred by gravitational effects and stuff like that, but weren't actually seen.

[Frater I*I]

Is our planet an exoplanet?

Hoo boy, my autospell did NOT want to let me type that word. Exoplanet exoplanet exoplanet hahaha never let the computer win, that's my philosophy.

It tried to force me to type explanation instead. No, explanations don't revolve around stars.

So you'll be our leader when the Great Machine Wars begin....

[RVInit]

[neonzx]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qCGR7CiJ-Wo

[RTH10260]

HELP! The green (men, women, critters ?) are coming

Exotic green comet not seen since stone age returns to skies above Earth

• Comet C/2022 E3, which orbits the sun every 50,000 years, will be closest to us next Wednesday and Thursday
  The Comet C/2022 E3 (ZTF) could be visible to the naked eye as it whizzes past Earth, astronomers have said.

Ian Sample Science editor
Mon 23 Jan 2023 22.29 GMT

An exotic green comet that has not passed Earth since the time of the Neanderthals has reappeared in the sky ready for its closest approach to the planet next week.

Discovered last March by astronomers at the Zwicky Transient Facility at the Palomar Observatory in California, comet C/2022 E3 (ZTF) was calculated to orbit the sun every 50,000 years, meaning it last tore past our home planet in the stone age.

The comet, which comes from the Oort cloud at the edge of the solar system, will come closest to Earth on Wednesday and Thursday next week when it shoots past the planet at a distance of 2.5 light minutes – a mere 27m miles.

Comets are balls of primordial dust and ice that swing around the sun in giant elliptical orbits. As they approach the sun, the bodies warm up, turning surface ice into gas and dislodging dust. Together, this creates the cloud or coma which surrounds the comet’s hard nucleus and the dusty tail that accompanies it.

Images already taken of comet C/2022 E3 reveal a subtle green glow that is thought to arise from the presence of diatomic carbon – pairs of carbon atoms that are bound together – in the head of the comet. The molecule emits green light when excited by the ultraviolet rays in solar radiation.




https://www.theguardian.com/science/202 ... bove-earth

[RTH10260]

Living in dangerous times

Asteroid 2023 BU about to pass Earth in one of closest ever encounters
No danger, says Nasa, from delivery truck-sized asteroid that was discovered on Saturday and will pass lower than communication satellites

Guardian staff and agencies
Thu 26 Jan 2023 01.24 GMT

An asteroid the size of a delivery truck will pass Earth in one of the closest such encounters ever recorded – coming within a tenth of the distance of most communication satellites’ orbit.

Nasa said the newly discovered asteroid would pass 2,200 miles (3,600km) above the southern tip of South America at 7.27pm US eastern time on Thursday (12.27am GMT on Friday).

Nasa said it would be a near miss with no chance of hitting Earth. Even if it came a lot closer, scientists said most of it would burn up in the atmosphere, with bigger pieces possibly falling as meteorites.

Nasa’s impact hazard assessment system, called Scout, quickly ruled out a strike, said its developer, Davide Farnocchia, an engineer at the agency’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California.

“But despite the very few observations, it was nonetheless able to predict that the asteroid would make an extraordinarily close approach with Earth,” Farnocchia said. “In fact, this is one of the closest approaches by a known near-Earth object ever recorded.”

Discovered on Saturday, the asteroid known as 2023 BU is believed to be between 11ft (3.5m) and 28ft (8.5m) across.

It was first spotted by the same amateur astronomer in Crimea, Gennady Borisov, who discovered an interstellar comet in 2019. Within a few days, dozens of observations were made by astronomers around the world, allowing them to refine the asteroid’s path.




https://www.theguardian.com/science/202 ... encounters

[RVInit]

[AndyinPA]

Very cool. Thanks.

[AndyinPA]

https://www.theguardian.com/science/202 ... ex-florida

A camera on top of Hawaii’s tallest mountain has captured what looks like a spiral swirling through the night sky.

Researchers believe the strange phenomenon is linked to a military GPS satellite that launched from a SpaceX rocket in Florida.

The images were captured on 18 January by a camera at the summit of Mauna Kea, outside the National Astronomical Observatory of Japan’s Subaru telescope.

A time-lapse video shows a white orb spreading out and forming a spiral as it moves across the sky. It then fades and disappears.

Sort of falls into "etc."

[Volkonski]

AP

It turns out Jupiter has more moons than Saturn. Astronomers have discovered 12 new moons around Jupiter, putting the total count at 92, more than any other planet in our solar system. Saturn has 83 confirmed moons.

https://apnews.com/article/science-hawa ... 4802e47141

[RTH10260]

Talk about inflation

[neonzx]

And we only get ONE. What a rip-off.

[Foggy]

Ours makes the tides roll, which causes surf. Surf is a good thing.

Ninety two stinkin' moons, and you can't surf, or even bodysurf, anywhere on Jupiter. Or Saturn, to be honest.

Who needs it?

[pipistrelle]

Ours makes the tides roll, which causes surf. Surf is a good thing.

Ninety two stinkin' moons, and you can't surf, or even bodysurf, anywhere on Jupiter. Or Saturn, to be honest.

Who needs it?

Do you know that for sure?

[Foggy]

It was on the Internet.

[chancery]

Talk about inflation

I see what you did there

[PaulG]

https://www.theguardian.com/science/202 ... ex-florida

A camera on top of Hawaii’s tallest mountain has captured what looks like a spiral swirling through the night sky.

Researchers believe the strange phenomenon is linked to a military GPS satellite that launched from a SpaceX rocket in Florida.

The images were captured on 18 January by a camera at the summit of Mauna Kea, outside the National Astronomical Observatory of Japan’s Subaru telescope.

A time-lapse video shows a white orb spreading out and forming a spiral as it moves across the sky. It then fades and disappears.

Sort of falls into "etc."

I was googling around to find out more and found an article in University of Hawaiʻi News. Oddly, the article was from April 2022 when the same thing happened. Is that what that camera is there for?
https://www.hawaii.edu/news/2022/04/26/ ... telescope/

[RTH10260]

NASA confirms half-ton meteor crashed in South Texas

Greg Wehner
Mon, February 20, 2023 at 1:36 AM GMT+1

A nearly 1,000-pound meteor measuring two feet wide crashed into South Texas on Wednesday, according to reports.

Fox station KDFW in Dallas reported that NASA confirmed the meteor broke apart as it fell through the atmosphere to its resting place near McAllen, Texas, at about 6 p.m.

"Although meteorites tend to hit Earth’s atmosphere at high speeds, they slow as they travel through the atmosphere, breaking into small fragments before hitting the ground. Meteorites cool rapidly and generally are not a risk to the public," NASA said in a statement.

The space agency posted a report of the incident along with a map showing an area where pieces of the meteor likely landed.

KDFW posted a video captured from a home security camera with birds scattering and the sound of a sonic boom.

According to the National Weather Service in Brownsville/Rio Grande Valley, multiple people reported a possible meteor in the sky west of McAllen. The weather agency also reported that the flash from the meteor was captured by a Geostationary Lightning Mapper right before 5:30 p.m.

The lightning mapper satellite measures lightning from space, and in a Facebook post on Wednesday, the NWS said there was no thunderstorm activity in the area when the meteor crashed.

Hidalgo County Sheriff Eddie Guerra posted to Twitter that he was informed by air traffic controllers in Houston that two aircraft reported that they also saw a meteor in the sky near McAllen.

"The meteor seen in the skies above McAllen is a reminder of the need for NASA and other organizations to increase our understanding and protection of Earth, to combine scientific and engineering expertise to advance human space exploration, to integrate terrestrial and planetary research for furthering our understanding of the solar system, and to promote successful space missions by mitigating risk," NASA said.




https://www.yahoo.com/news/nasa-confirm ... 41053.html

(original: Fox News)

[Tiredretiredlawyer]

It's a sign from dog!!!!!!

[pjhimself]

[Tiredretiredlawyer]

Does Mars know?

[RTH10260]

Australia left in the dark ...

Solar eclipse wrap
A hybrid solar eclipse reached totality over Australia today.

In Exmouth, thousands of people from all over the world gathered to watch the partial eclipse slowly move across the sky until it completely blacked out the sun’s light for 58 seconds.

The eclipse was called “otherworldly,” “a unifying experience” and “one of the most exciting astronomical events on this planet” by eclipse-chasers. The dry red ground of a remote WA campsite became a melting pot of languages, ages, music, food and technologies – turning a solar viewing experience into a mismatch of Burning Man and Mad Max.

Across cloudier cities like Sydney and Melbourne, eclipse viewing was not so surreal (or was not possible at all). Nonetheless, across the country, people still looked to the sky with DIY sun catchers, hoping to see their reflection of a crescent sun nearby.



https://www.theguardian.com/australia-n ... atest-news

[keith]

We have a friend that chases eclipses. He was in Exmouth for this one. He'll be getting on the indian-Pacific train as we get off to go west to east.

[Mrich]

There will be another total eclipse over the US April 8, 2024.
Map of the totality here - it's the lower left to upper right path:
https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap230418.html

2 days ago I ordered a set of 10 "eclipse glasses" for under $20 (including shipping and tax) here:
https://www.greatamericaneclipse.com/ec ... ng-glasses

Got them today, which is faster than Amazon Prime gets stuff here! I ordered some a while back for the 8/21/17 eclipse, but I later sent them to a group that gives them away in when other countries experience eclipses so I couldn't reuse them.

Here's a site with more info:
https://nationaleclipse.com

My niece's inlaws live in Lima Ohio which is in the path of 100% totality, so I will be there for this one. I had a great time viewing the 2017 eclipse; got this picture using a little vegetable strainer:

colander.jpg (15.85 KiB) Viewed 2615 times