The Night Sky

I wonder if this is Aliens egging us?
Or Alien waste from their ships?

Or just a rock?

:alien:

Very cool photo of the "Lucy" spacecraft launch from Cape Canaveral. Lucy will explore the composition of "Trojan Asteroids" near Jupiter in hope it will give information why gas giant vs rock planets form.

[URL unfurl="true"]https://www.yahoo.com/news/pancake-jupiter-juno-probe-reveals-180133406.html[/URL]

Cool picture of a light pillar over erupting Mt. Etna in Sicily...

[URL unfurl="true"]https://www.yahoo.com/news/brightest-comet-leonard-approaching-earth-100214589.html[/URL]

[URL unfurl="true"]https://www.yahoo.com/news/brightest-comet-leonard-approaching-earth-100214589.html[/URL]

Comet Lenny passing by the Whale Galaxy...

[URL unfurl="true"]https://www.yahoo.com/news/massive-planet-10-times-bigger-224427538.html[/URL]

The newly discovered b Centauri (AB)b [is an exoplanet]('

Very interesting read on the Carrington Event

[URL unfurl="true"]https://astronomy.com/news/2021/09/understanding-just-how-big-solar-flares-can-get[/URL]

Saw on FB

Hey boys and girls, be sure to go outside tonight at 6:21 and look up to see the international space station zipping past us at more than 17,000 mph. It will be traveling from the northwest to the south southeast. Be sure to set your alarm and don’t be late because it will be visible for only six minutes

VENUS tonight…

.

Nice photo of Comet Lenny and the Hercules Cluster (M3). I'll grab the binoculars first clear night and see if I can find the comet next clear night...

[URL unfurl="true"]https://www.yahoo.com/news/nasa-craft-touches-sun-1st-202306871.html[/URL]

Poor photographer! He was all set up to photograph Comet Leonard in California and this Fireball photobombed him...

BIG ASTRONOMY NEWS THIS MONTH!!

[HEADING=2]What’s up in December: Two meteor showers, and Venus at its most brilliant[/HEADING]
Perhaps the highlight of the month will be the long-awaited launch of the James Webb Space Telescope on Dec. 22.

Perhaps the highlight of the month, and maybe even the entire 21st century so far, will be the long-awaited launch of the James Webb Space Telescope on Dec. 22. Since it is all folded up at launch to fit into the Arianne 5 rocket, it has to execute nearly 400 distinct unfolding maneuvers flawlessly over the next two weeks. Then it will take another two weeks to get to its destination at the L2 point over 1 million miles out in space. After that, it will take another five months or so to be fully calibrated and start discovering amazing new things about our universe that will definitely rewrite our textbooks. I will write much more about its progress as that whole process unfolds.

Great shot of a SpaceX launch from Kennedy Space Center...

Webb Telescope on it's way to the LaGrange Point, 1 million miles from earth, it's "station", 20 minutes into the flight and all is optimal. Kind of sad that it couldn't be launched from the US. Props to the Euro Space Crew, their rocket worked perfectly. The Monkey is now on the back of the US mission folks at Johns Hopkins in Baltimore. Godspeed Webb Telescope!!

[MEDIA=youtube]ZcskZsWSyw0[/MEDIA]

2 Christmas Comets in Thailand?? Nah, one just over the pagoda is Comet Lenny, the other one is the plume trail of the Ariane rocket on it's mission to put the Webb Telescope into its orbit around the sun.

[HEADING=2]NASA’s new space telescope ‘hunky-dory’ after problems fixed[/HEADING]
[pressherald.com/2022/01/03/nasas-new-space-telescope-hunky-dory-after-problems-fixed/]('https://www.pressherald.com/2022/01/03/nasas-new-space-telescope-hunky-dory-after-problems-fixed/')

By MARCIA DUNN January 4, 2022
[IMG alt="The James Webb Space Telescope is separated in space on Dec. 25.

"]https://multifiles.pressherald.com/uploads/sites/4/2022/01/NASA_Space_Telescope_18329-1641271315.jpg[/IMG]

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. — NASA’s new space telescope is on the verge of completing the riskiest part of its mission – unfolding and tightening a huge sunshade – after ground controllers fixed a pair of problems, officials said Monday.

The tennis court-size sunshield on the James Webb Space Telescope is now fully open and in the process of being stretched tight. The operation should be complete by Wednesday.

The $10 billion telescope – the largest and most powerful astronomical observatory ever launched – rocketed away Christmas Day from French Guiana. Its sunshield and primary mirror had to be folded to fit into the European Ariane rocket.

The sunshield is vital for keeping Webb’s infrared-sensing instruments at subzero temperatures, as they scan the universe for the first stars and galaxies, and examine the atmospheres of alien worlds for possible signs of life.

Getting the sunshield extended last Friday “was really a huge achievement for us,” said project manager Bill Ochs. All 107 release pins opened properly.

But there have been a few obstacles.

Flight controllers in Maryland had to reset Webb’s solar panel to draw more power. The observatory – considered the successor to the aging Hubble Space Telescope – was never in any danger, with a constant power flow, said Amy Lo, a lead engineer for the telescope’s prime contractor, Northrop Grumman.

They also repointed the telescope to limit sunlight on six overheating motors. The motors cooled enough to begin securing the sunshield, a three-day process that can be halted if the problem crops up again, officials said.

“Everything is hunky-dory and doing well now,” Lo said.

Ochs expects the tightening of the sunshield to be drama-free.

“The best thing for operations is boring, and that’s what we anticipate over the next three days, is to be boring,” he told reporters in a teleconference.

If that holds true, the telescope’s gold-plated mirror – more than 21 feet across – could unfold as soon as this weekend.

Webb should reach its destination 1 million miles away by the end of January. As of Monday, the telescope was more than halfway there. The infrared telescope should begin observing the cosmos by the end of June, ultimately unveiling the first stars and galaxies formed in the universe 13.7 billion years ago. That’s a mere 100 million years after the universe-creating Big Bang.

Launched in 1990, Hubble, which sees primarily visible light, has peered as far back as 13.4 billion years ago. Astronomers hope to close the gap with Webb, which is 100 times more powerful.

In another bit of good news Monday, officials said they expect Webb to last well beyond the originally anticipated 10 years based on its fuel efficiency.

One of history's great quotes was uttered by Galileo Galilei when he turned his newly acquired telescope towards Venus, "I have seen the Horns of Venus!!" Horns of Venus??? WTH is that you may ask? It's just a way of saying he saw a crescent Venus, like the crescent moon we're always seeing. The fact that Venus has phases like the moon was a key observation for Galileo's heretical confirmation of Copernicus' statement that the Sun, not Earth, is the center of our Solar System.

Well today's Astronomy Picture of the Day, let's you see the "Horns of Venus"...