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[ September 2006 News | News Archive | November 2006 News ]
October
2006
Tuesday
- "Only Five More Days for Your Name to Rise With the Dawn," NASA JPL 30 Oct.
KEYWORDS: 1 Ceres, 4 Vesta, Dawn mission - "NASA Announces Discovery Program Selections," NASA 30 Oct. - Note: Concept study funding includes the new OSIRIS mission, two proposals for extending the Deep Impact mission, and an extended Stardust mission.
- "NASA Awards Funding For Possible UA-Led Asteroid Sample-Return Mission," Univ. of Arizona 30 Oct. - Quote: "[OSIRIS] would identify such resources as water, precious metals and other materials needed by future human explorers in near-Earth space, [and] accurately measure the 'Yarkovsky effect' for the first time."
October
2006
Monday
- "Rocked by $1m space theft," Daily Telegraph 30 Oct. - Note: Binya meteorite stolen. See more about this object here (may not view well in Firefox browsers).
KEYWORDS: meteorite theft
October
2006
Sunday
- "'Meteor' caused mystery explosion," BBC 29 Oct.
KEYWORDS: 2006 Oct. 26 England event - "Plotting Pluto's Comeback" (temp link), Newsweek dated 6 Nov., posted 29 Oct. - Quote: "Although the IAU isn't scheduled to meet again until 2009, plans are being laid for an ad hoc conference of astronomers next year ... that will almost certainly restore Pluto's status... [This is] a bit like holding a conference to decide whether tomatoes are a fruit or a vegetable. But there is pride at stake."
KEYWORDS: IAU planet definition
October
2006
Saturday
- "2006 Orionid Shower," Cloudbait Observatory 23 Oct. - Quote: "This is a composite image of 230 meteors collected on the evenings of October 18-22."
KEYWORDS: all-sky meteor camera, Orionids - "Occultation by (253) Mathilde, 2006 October 15," posted by David Dunham/IOTA 16 Oct. - Note: See his Occultation Updates page for links to more-successful shape determinations this month of star shadows cast by less-famous and less-known Main Belt asteroids 25 Phocaea and 200 Dynamene, and much more.
KEYWORDS: NEAR asteroid mission
October
2006
Friday
- "Comet Swan Photo Gallery," SpaceWeather.com 26 Oct.
- "Wow! Striking Green Comet Suddenly Visible in Evening Sky," Space.com 26 Oct.
- "C/2006 M4 (SWAN)," Cometography 25 Oct.
- "Astronomy Picture of the Day," NASA GSFC 4 Oct.
- "Nasa to decide Hubble's fate," BBC 26 Oct.
KEYWORDS: HST, space-based astronomy - "Undergrad Proposes Asteroids As Radiation Shields
," Technovelgy.com 25 Oct.
KEYWORDS: minor object development, NIAC
October
2006
Wednesday
- SpaceWeather.com is reporting on Oct. 25th that comet SWAN may have become naked-eye visible.
KEYWORDS: C/2006 M4 (SWAN) - "Star Ends Infancy Abruptly," Subaru Telescope 23 Oct.
KEYWORDS: HD 141569A planetary disk
October
2006
Tuesday
- "Russia can build anti-asteroid systems if necessary -- official" (temp link), ITAR-TASS 24 Oct. - Editor's note: The bit in this story about "Asteroid 2907, which ... may ram the Earth on December 16, 2880" appears to be a reference to 29075 1950 DA, which has a well-determined but slim impact possibility for 16 March 2880. Such sloppiness in fact checking is typical of Russian news media tabloid-style stories on supposed Earth impact risks, reporting that may get picked up by reputable news online sites such as The Times here via AFP and The Independent here via SAPA/AFP, but rarely merits linking at A/CC.
KEYWORDS: hazard mitigation, Russia - "Hitch hike to Mars inside an asteroid," New Scientist 23 Oct. - Note: For more about the need for radiation protection on Mars missions, see How Safe is Travel to Mars? at NASA Astrobiology Magazine on 23 Oct.
KEYWORDS: minor object development, NIAC - "Geologists discover 'impact' crater in Rann of Kutch," PTI at The Navhind Times 23 Oct. - Quote: "Indian geologists claim to have discovered a possible impact crater in Kutch district of Gujarat dating back to the Vedic period."
KEYWORDS: India - "Asteroid deflection is a possibility," SABC News 21 Oct. - Note: This story is also here at The Independent 22 Oct.
KEYWORDS: ESA Don Quixote mission, hazard mitigation - "Re-Teaching The Map Of The Solar System," AP at CBS News 21 Oct. - Quote: "Governor teaches her students about the solar system by having them measure and label orbits of each planet on a long roll of toilet paper. On one end is the sun; 250 sheets away is Pluto's outer orbit."
KEYWORDS: IAU planet definition - "Magdalena Ridge Observatory to Officially Open," New Mexico Tech 20 Oct. - Quote: "Initial research being planned for the MRO 2.4-meter telescope will [start] with a study of small bodies in our own Solar System, particularly near-Earth objects such as asteroids."
KEYWORDS: optical interferometer - "UCLA scientist sees dream take flight," UCLA The Daily Bruin 20 Oct.- Quote: "We'll be able to see if there are any dark, stealth asteroids out there."
- "NASA Approves Construction of Satellite," UCLA 18 Oct.
- See more info below.
October
2006
Monday
- "2006 Orionid Meteor Gallery," SpaceWeather.com 23 Oct., with links to more images and Web sites
KEYWORDS: Orionids - "Meteor shower has Coast Guard hopping," The Daily Astorian, 20 Oct.
KEYWORDS: Oregon, Orionids - "German cottage destroyed by meteor," Reuters 20 Oct. - Note: This as presented is an unlikely story. A search of online English-language news media on Oct. 23rd didn't find any follow-up confirmation or correction.
KEYWORDS: 2006 Oct. 10 Germany event - "Fire in Las Vegas Sky Caused by Military Flare," KLAS-TV 19 Oct., with video
KEYWORDS: Nevada
October
2006
Thursday
- "Mauna Kea telescopes knocked around," AP at The Honolulu Advertiser 19 Oct., also here at MSNBC on 19 Oct. - Quote: "Keck's engineers will have to recalibrate both telescopes to account for the seismic shifts that moved the Keck I telescope more than 1/8 inch and the Keck II telescope more than 1 inch."
KEYWORDS: 2006 Oct. 15 Hawaiian earthquake - "A Curiouser and Curiouser KBO," Sky & Telescope 18 Oct. - Report: 2003 EL61 has two satellites and is elongated (perhaps longer on its long axis than 136199 Eris is wide), appears to be solid rock, and has a family of perhaps five or more other KBOs.
KEYWORDS: KBO spectroscopy
October
2006
Wednesday
- "Built-in guards protect instruments on Mauna Kea from serious damage," Honolulu Star-Bulletin 18 Oct. - Quote: "[The 2.2-meter UH telescope] won't be usable for three or four days at least."
- "Status of UKIRT post-earthquake," U.K. IR Telescope 17 Oct. - Quote: "Weather is still not allowing us to open and check pointing."
- "Earthquake Aftermath at CFHT," Canada-France-Hawaii Telescope 15-17 Oct. - Quote: "We don't expect to have anything operational for at least three more nights."
- "Earthquake Report," NASA IRTF 17 Oct. - Quote: "We just opened up this morning (Oct. 17) for observations of Saturn and are operating normally."
- "FTN and FTS status - Faulkes Telescope Project 18 Oct.
KEYWORDS: robotic telescopes - "Meteorites' value astronomical," KVOA-TV Tucson 18 Oct.
KEYWORDS: Marvin Killgore, Southwest Meteorite Center - "Scientist who found '10th planet' discusses downgrading of Pluto," Stanford Report 18 Oct.
KEYWORDS: 136199 Eris (2003 UB313), IAU planet definition, Michael Brown - "SOFIA Reborn: High-Flying Observatory Faces Years of Flight Tests," Space.com 18 Oct.
KEYWORDS: airborne astronomy - "Far More Than a Meteor Killed Dinos," GSA 17 Oct. - Quote: "The Chicxulub impact may, in fact, have been the lesser and earlier of a series of meteors and volcanic eruptions that pounded life on Earth for more than 500,000 years."
KEYWORDS: K-T boundary
October
2006
Tuesday
- "Keck Sees Past the Quake," Science Now 17 Oct.
- "Mauna Kea Earthquake Update," Sky & Telescope 17 Oct.
- Hawaiian observatory post-earthquake status reports
- James Clerk Maxwell Telescope on Mauna Kea 17 Oct. update: "Foul weather last night (Monday) prevented any observing, but most systems appear to be operational."
- Subaru Telescope on Mauna Kea 17 Oct. update: "After two days of assessment by staff working emergency shifts, visual inspection has shown that the Subaru telescope avoided major damage from the earthquakes that shook Hawaii."
- Gemini North on Mauna Kea, 16-17 Oct.: "It is still impossible to predict when we will return to normal operation."
- Faulkes Telescope North on Haleakala 16 Oct.: "[The] telescope and systems appeared to have survived intact."
- W.M. Keck Observatory on Mauna Kea, 16 Oct.: "As of Monday, officials estimated it would take a few days to return Keck I to operational status. It will take at least this long to restore Keck II functionality."
- Canada-France-Hawaii Telescope on Mauna Kea 16 Oct.: "It is likely that we might be out of commission for some time." (Note: This report has since been revised and put here with later updates.)
- "Strong Leonid Meteor Shower Expected in November," Space.com 17 Oct.
KEYWORDS: Leonids - "Scientists find unusual meteorite in Kansas field," AP at MSNBC 16 Oct. - "[The] scientific experts at the site were able to debunk prevailing wisdom that the spectacular Brenham meteorite fall occurred 20,000 years ago. Its location in the Pleistocene epoch soil layer puts that date closer to 10,000 years ago."
KEYWORDS: pallasite, Steve Arnold
October
2006
Monday
- A/CC hasn't picked up any official statements or news media reports yet that indicate anything about how well the observatories on Mauna Kea and Haleakala have come through yesterday's major earthquake. The University of Hawaii is back on line ("Earthquake update: All UH campuses are open for classes") and now also its Institute for Astronomy. Here are some general news links, including a timely piece from a day earlier about how the top of Mauna Kea, the world's tallest mountain from base to peak, will someday sink below sea level. The geologic term in play here is isostasy.
- "Mystery surrounds temblors' origins," Honolulu Star-Bulletin 16 Oct.
- "First Person Account: 6.6 Earthquake - Kona, Hawaii," Directions Magazine 15 Oct.
- "Kiss that Hawaiian timeshare goodbye," San Francisco Chronicle 14 Oct.
- "Dancing Asteroid Mapped in Motion," Space.com 16 Oct.
KEYWORDS: 66391 1999 KW4, Arecibo, planetary radar - "JHU Joins Consortium for Powerful New Telescope," The JHU Gazette 16 Oct.
KEYWORDS: Pan-STARRS, risk monitoring - "From Ugly Duckling to Beautiful Swan," Sky & Telescope 16 Oct.
KEYWORDS: airborne astronomy, SOFIA - "Images of Dwarf Planet Ceres," Keck Observatory 11 Oct.
KEYWORDS: 1 Ceres, infrared
October
2006
Saturday
- "Natural History Museum Blog Reveals Meteorite Search in Australia," 24 Hour Museum 13-14 Oct.
- NHM Meteorites search blog
- "Oz desert best to photograph fireballs," ABC Australia 19 Oct. 2004
- Desert Fireball Network
- "Doubts cast on meteorite," Kansas City Star 14 Oct.
- "Kiowa Co. used as substitute for Mars," The Hutchinson News 14 Oct.
- "Meteorite may point to an even larger find," Houston Chronicle 14 Oct.
- "NASA Says: 'Build It and Infrared Surprises Will Come'," NASA JPL 13 Oct. - Quote: "[WISE] is scheduled to launch into an Earth orbit in late 2009. It will spend seven months collecting data." The WISE Science page says "[Asteroids] absorb most of the sunlight that hits them and heat up to glow in the mid-infrared. WISE will be able to measure the diameters of more than 100,000 asteroids [and will also see] debris trails of comets [and] provide a complete inventory of nearby young stars and their dusty disks." Update: See more info above.
KEYWORDS: space-based astronomy, WISE observatory
October
2006
Friday
- "ISU professor in middle of the Pluto controversy," Des Moines Register 13 Oct.
KEYWORDS: IAU planet definition - "Nearly Naked: Large swath of Pacific lacks seafloor sediment," 13-14 Oct. - Quote: "[Meteor] dust, which falls evenly over Earth's surface, may be more easily detectable in the bare zone than elsewhere."
KEYWORDS: South Pacific - "Power restored to Hubble camera detector," AP at MSNBC 13 Oct.
KEYWORDS: HST - "The Orionid Meteor Shower: See the Legacy of Halley's Comet," Space.com 13 Oct.
KEYWORDS: 1P/Halley, Orionids - "Does world-record meteorite await unearthing in Kansas?" Kansas City Star 13 Oct.
KEYWORDS: Brenham, Hoba, pallasite, Steve Arnold - "Cranbourne in star city bid," Star News Group 13 Oct. - Quote: "Cranbourne [Victoria] locals are pulling together to make their little patch on the third rock from the sun the meteorite capital of Australia."
KEYWORDS:
October
2006
Thursday
- "First detailed pictures of asteroid reveal bizarre system," Univ. of Michigan 12 Oct.
- "Binary Asteroid (66391) 1999 KW4," NASA JPL 12 Oct. - Quote from the linked info sheet: "The KW4 results have profound consequences for ideas about [hazard] mitigation ... because the physical nature of the primary component would make landing very difficult and the system's complex dynamics would make even simple maneuvering of spacecraft close to the bodies harrowing."
- "Fire in the sky" (last item), Corvallis Gazette Times 12 Oct. - Note: This follows-up on a Sept. 15th item and reports that two more witnesses came forward regarding an event now described as happening "late in August 2006."
KEYWORDS: 2006 Aug. Oregon event - "Saturn's Rings Show Evidence of a Modern-Day Collision," NASA JPL 11 Oct. - Quote: "Based on observations between 1995 and 2006, [a reconstructed timeline estimates] the collision occurred in 1984." See also a Sky & Telescope article from 12-13 Oct.
KEYWORDS: Cassini mission, D ring - "A film of the heavens," Max Planck Institute at EurekAlert 11 Oct.
KEYWORDS: Pan-STARRS PS1, risk monitoring - "Cometary Puzzles," Sky & Telescope 11 Oct.
- "Comet compositions show striking differences," New Scientist 11 Oct.
October
2006
Wednesday
- "Near infrared mapping of Ceres surface," AAS at SpaceRef.com 11 Oct.
- "Fresh look at dwarf planet Ceres," BBC 10 Oct. - Quote: "The images are the first of an asteroid/dwarf planet using infrared and advanced adaptive optics."
- "Asteroids, Comets, and Planets: Cut from the Same Cloth?" Spitzer Space Telescope 10 Oct.
KEYWORDS: 9P/Tempel 1, C/1995 O1 (Hale-Bopp), Deep Impact comet mission, HD 100546 - "Dale P. Cruikshank - 2006 Gerard P. Kuiper Prize Winner," AAS DPS at SpaceRef.com 10 Oct.
KEYWORDS: minor body infrared spectroscopy - "SOFIA Comes Out Of The Hangar With Finished Paint Job," SOFIA 6 Oct.
KEYWORDS: airborne astronomy
October
2006
Tuesday
- "In search of meteorites," Colorado Springs Gazette 10 Oct. - An expanded version of this article was posted as "Diamond in the Rough" on Oct. 11th.
- "October 1, 2006 Fireball" - Note: This Cloudbait Observatory page was updated 9 Oct. with a revised map and info about possibilities for meteorites resulting from this spectacular aerial event.
- "How the Distant World of Eris Caused Big Changes Here on Earth," VOA 10 Oct.
KEYWORDS: 136199 Eris (2003 UB313), IAU planet definition, Pluto - "Why Doesn't Venus Have a Moon?" Sky & Telescope 10 Oct. - Quote: "[New models] suggest Venus was not only slammed with a rock large enough to form the Moon, the event happened at least twice... [The first moon] slowly spiraled away from the planet [and the second] merged with Venus in a dramatic, fatal encounter." Question: Where did that first moon go?
KEYWORDS: Earth-Moon system formation - "City of Elko receives its own cosmic twin," Deseret News 10 Oct.
KEYWORDS: 80180 Elko (1999 VS), IAU namings - "Prepare to meteor maker," The Northern Echo 10 Oct.
- "UK to join 'killer' asteroid hunt," BBC 9 Oct.
- "Cosmologists of world want Pan-STARRS," The Maui News 9 Oct.
- "Second Deep Space Manoeuvre," ESA Rosetta mission 9 Oct. - Status report: "The manoeuvre was executed on 29 September at 02:00 UTC."
- "Thermal Characterisation," ESA Rosetta mission 22 Sept.
- "Rebel Science: Lecture unveils DNA time capsules," Univ. of Nevada at Las Vegas The Rebel Yell 9 Oct. - Quote: "If halite formation/precipitation requires a body of evaporating water, when and where did this meteor, a supposed remnant from the solar system's formation, ever come into contact with mineralized water?"
KEYWORDS: Monahan meteorite - "Hubble observations confirm that planets form from disks around stars," ESA HST 9 Oct.
- "Pitt Measurements of Jupiter-size Planet Confirmed by Hubble," Univ. of Pittsburgh 9 Oct.
- "Nearest Planet Beyond Solar System Might Be Photogenic," Space.com 9 Oct.
October
2006
Sunday
- "Maui telescope draws star partners," Honolulu Star-Bulletin 8 Oct.
- "Astronomers unite to use Hawaii telescope," UH IFA 3 Oct.
- "T Rex was born in the Irish Sea, say scientists," London Sunday Times 8 Oct. - Quote: "[Scientists] have not found the crater itself, but they believe the meteor may have hit what is now St George’s Channel ... 200m years ago."
KEYWORDS: PT extinction - "Start of operations for FTN and FTS," Faulkes Telescope Project 3 Sept. - Quote: "We are looking forward to finally having two telescopes up-and-running by mid-autumn."
KEYWORDS: robotic telescopes
October
2006
Friday
- "2006 RZ Planning," JPL radar page 5 Oct. - See some gorgeous preliminary radar imagery from 4 and 5 October from Goldstone in southern California.
KEYWORDS: planetary radar - "Egypt's Craters Pose Geological Riddle," Discovery channel 6 Oct. - Quote: "They're clearly not impact craters... There's nothing in our current geological literature that describes them."
KEYWORDS: Gilf Kebir - "Tiny meteor punched hole in shuttle, NASA says," AP at the News-Press 6 Oct.
- "NASA: Atlantis Shuttle's Radiator Struck by Object in September Flight," Space.com 5 Oct. - Quote: "...a micrometeoroid or other piece of orbital debris..."
October
2006
Thursday
- This is World Space Week 4-10 Oct., dates of the first artificial-satellite launch and adoption of the 1967 Outer Space Treaty.
KEYWORDS: public outreach - "Asteroid named after Chinese middle school," Xinhua 5 Oct.
- "Name-dropping of astronomical proportions," CBC 27 Sept. - Quote: "[The] naming process has gotten a lot tighter in the last couple of years, in some large measure because professional astronomers think it is a kind of a nuisance." Note: Asteroids with Canadian Connections
- "Students save Earth from asteroid in virtual lab," Space Foundation at SpaceRef.com 5 Oct.
KEYWORDS: 99942 Apophis (2004 MN4) - "New Telescope Another Star in UCF’s Rising Astronomy Program," Univ. of Central Florida 4 Oct. - Quote: "We are among the top 10 planetary research groups in the country."
KEYWORDS: Robinson Observatory - "Planets Prefer Safe Neighborhoods," Univ. of Arizona 3 Oct. - Also available at SST Web site.
- "Watching How Planets Form," ESO 28 Sept. - Quote: "The dust mass derived here is more than thousand times larger than what is observed in debris discs and Kuiper belt-like structures found around older, 'Vega-like' stars, such as Beta Pictoris, Vega, Fomalhaut and HR 4796."
- "Planet-Forming Disks Might Put the Brakes on Stars," Spitzer Space Telescope 24 July
- "Oct. 17 - 18 Meeting in Tucson Focuses on Visionary Space Projects," Univ. of Arizona 29 Sept. - Note: NIAC Student Fellows presentations will include using NEAs for radiation shielding for travel to Mars by Daniella Della-Giustina and using NEAs with tether technology by Jonathan Sharma.
KEYWORDS: minor object development, NIAC - "Jupiter Ahoy!" NASA New Horizons mission 26 Sept.
- "Changing Seasons on the Road Trip to Planet 9," NASA New Horizons mission 21 Sept. - Quote: "We were also surprised to experience a planned spacecraft turn on Sept. 4 that sliced the Sun briefly across the open telescopes."
- "'Pseudo-MPEC' for 6Q0B44E," Bill Gray 3 Sept. - Quote: "[This] object is called an 'artificial satellite', but ... it's still possible that this is a dwarf asteroid... With the current data, it looks as if this object probably entered the Earth/Moon system sometime between about 2000 and 2003, though dates as far back as 1991 are quite possible." Note: Absolute magnitude (brightness) H=30.4 for a typical near-Earth asteroid converts by standard formula to a diameter on the order of three meters. KEYWORDS: natural Earth satellites
October
2006
Wednesday
- "How I Found My New Comet" by David H. Levy, Sky & Telescope 4 Oct.
- MPEC 2006-T21, IAU MPC 3 Oct.
- "Meteor awes Foothills residents," The Arizona Republic 4 Oct.
- "October 1, 2006 Fireball," Cloudbait Observatory 3 Oct. - Quote: "This is the longest fireball I've recorded, lasting some 27 seconds. Other camera data suggest its full flight lasted at least 45 seconds." Note: This Cloudbait page was updated on 9 Oct. with more info about possibilities for finding meteorites.
- "Strange, bright lights surprise stargazers," The Santa Fe New Mexican 3 Oct. - Note: Arizona stays on Mountain Standard Time, so 10:15pm in Arizona, as well as 10:15pm in Washington state on Pacific Daylight Time, are the same as 11:15pm in the states of New Mexico, Colorado, and Wyoming, which are currently on Mountain Daylight Time. What was reported seen "over Seattle" some two hours earlier is a separate event (see Yakimah news below).
- "Arizonans bedazzled by meteor," The Arizona Republic 3 Oct.
- "Callers report Saguaro Lake fireball," East Valley Tribune 3 Oct.
- "Strange night lights streak over NM," KOB-TV 2 Oct.
- "Giant meteor sails over Saguaro Lake," The Arizona Republic 2 Oct.
- "Callers: Ball of fire at Saguaro Lake," East Valley Tribune 2 Oct.
- "UFO surprise in five cities," Sabah 4 Oct. - Quote: "In several regions of Turkey, there was a surprise sighting of [an object Saturday night] speculated to have been a meteor."
KEYWORDS: 2006 Sept. 30 Turkey event - "How a local boy found his destiny in the stars," Seattle Post-Intelligencer 4 Oct.
KEYWORDS: Washington state, meteor-wrong - "Meteor reported in Yakima area," AP at KXLY-TV 2 Oct. - Quote: "The flurry of calls began around 9 p.m. Sunday."
- "Toppenish woman recounts meteor experience," KNDO-TV 2 Oct.
- "John Gurke, CGCS, at Aurora Country Club finds a meteorite," WorldGolf.com 2 Oct.
KEYWORDS: Illinois
October
2006
Monday
- Comet C/2006 M4 (SWAN)
- SpaceWeather.com for 2 Oct. 2006 has images and details about how to view Comet SWAN now with binoculars or a small telescope.
- Chris Schur's Comet Swan page
- JPL SSD C/2006 M4 (SWAN)
- MPEC 2006-S89, IAU MPC 29 Sept.
[ September 2006 News | News Archive | November 2006 News ]