Return-path: X-Andrew-Authenticated-as: 7997;andrew.cmu.edu;Ted Anderson Received: from corsica.andrew.cmu.edu via trymail for +dist+/afs/andrew.cmu.edu/usr1/ota/space/space.dl@andrew.cmu.edu (->+dist+/afs/andrew.cmu.edu/usr1/ota/space/space.dl) (->ota+space.digests) ID ; Sun, 6 Aug 89 03:17:25 -0400 (EDT) Message-ID: Reply-To: space+@Andrew.CMU.EDU From: space-request+@Andrew.CMU.EDU To: space+@Andrew.CMU.EDU Date: Sun, 6 Aug 89 03:17:17 -0400 (EDT) Subject: SPACE Digest V9 #586 SPACE Digest Volume 9 : Issue 586 Today's Topics: Voyager Status for 07/25/89 (Forwarded) Apollo XI landing Re: Re: Henry's (not Weinhards) O'Brien returns to NASA as Assistant Deputy Administrator (Forwarded) Beyond Neptune Re: space news from June 19 AW&ST, and Apollo-anniversary editorial Re: SPACE Digest V9 #552 Cheerleading (was Re: Henry's (not Weinhards)) Catch-A-Planet (More than a Summary) Re: Space telescope - why only 1200 hours? ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: 25 Jul 89 23:34:59 GMT From: trident.arc.nasa.gov!yee@ames.arc.nasa.gov (Peter E. Yee) Subject: Voyager Status for 07/25/89 (Forwarded) Voyager Status Report July 25, 1989 Images of Neptune sent back by Voyager 2 in recent days show evidence of surprising variability in the large-scale weather patterns of the planet. Two images taken 53 hours apart show the previously observed small bright cloud breaking away from the edge of the large dark oval that dominates Neptune's face. A time-lapse movie of sequential Voyager images shows several small cloud features moving across the disc of the planet as it rotates. (One Neptune rotation is about 18 hours.) The smallest detail visible in the images now is about 1,700 kilometers (1,000 miles) across. The time-lapse images show Neptune's atmospheric circulation and are being used by Voyager scientists to clock wind speeds on Neptune. DISTANCE TO EARTH: 2,694,587,000 miles DISTANCE TO NEPTUNE: 27,510,000 miles HELIOCENTRIC VELOCITY: 42,188 mph ------------------------------ Date: TUE 25 JUL 1989 15:44:00 CDT From: Andy Edeburn To: Subject: Apollo XI landing Doug Pape (dbp@bcd-dyn!dsacg) writes: > .......just at landing, >something that looks like a hand holding a needle-like object appears >in the upper right-hand side of the picture and comes down across the w. >window. What was that? What did it do? What you saw was not an antenna but an indicator about five-feet long that that signaled the pilot when to shut off the lower-stage descent stage. When the probe hit the surface, the light in the cockpit came on, the commander killed the engine, and the LEM glided the last five feet to the surface. | Andy Edeburn {CC62@SDSUMUS} | "It is always better to trust | | Computing Center & Data Processing | your dog, rather than your | | South Dakota State University | neighbors." - Walton | ------------------------------ Date: 25 Jul 89 16:26:21 GMT From: hp-pcd!hpcvlx!gvg@hplabs.hp.com (Greg Goebel) Subject: Re: Re: Henry's (not Weinhards) / hpcvlx:sci.space / gvg@hpcvlx.HP.COM (Greg Goebel) / 9:25 am Jul 25, 1989 / I am sympathetic to Eugene Miya. The tenor of rec.space is in general the most strident of any newsgroup I read. It is not that some of the complaints are not justified (to say they are or are not would require both a level of knowledge and interest I do not possess) but that after a while they simply become numbing, and it go in one ear and out the other. +---------------------------------------------------------------------+ | Greg Goebel | | Hewlett-Packard CWO / 1000 NE Circle Boulevard / Corvallis OR 97330 | | (503) 750-3969 | | INTERNET: cwo_online@hp-pcd | | HP DESK: CWO ONLINE / HP3900 / 20 | +---------------------------------------------------------------------+ ---------- ------------------------------ Date: 25 Jul 89 22:36:51 GMT From: trident.arc.nasa.gov!yee@ames.arc.nasa.gov (Peter E. Yee) Subject: O'Brien returns to NASA as Assistant Deputy Administrator (Forwarded) David W. Garrett Headquarters, Washington, D.C. July 25, 1989 RELEASE: 89-125 O'BRIEN RETURNS TO NASA AS ASSISTANT DEPUTY ADMINISTRATOR NASA Administrator Richard H. Truly today announced that John E. O'Brien will return to NASA as Assistant Deputy Administrator, NASA Headquarters, effective July 30. In this position, O'Brien will support the agency's efforts in formulating plans to implement future goals in space as outlined by President Bush in his July 20 speech. Also, he will perform special analyses for the Administrator and be involved in management problem solving. O'Brien returns to NASA from the Washington law firm of Steptoe & Johnson where he specialized in defense and aerospace legal issues. He previously served as NASA General Counsel from August 1985 to July 1988 after serving as Deputy General Counsel since November 1981. He joined NASA in 1962 as staff attorney at NASA's Launch Operations Center, now the Kennedy Space Center. Prior to that position, he had served as staff attorney at the Navy General Counsels Office in Washington, D.C., from 1957 to 1962. In 1970, he was appointed Chief Counsel of the Kennedy Space Center and NASA Assistant General Counsel for Procurement Matters in 1973. O'Brien received the NASA Exceptional Service Medal in 1976 and the NASA Distinguished Service Medal in 1988. He was awarded the Presidential Rank of Meritorious Executive in 1980 and the Presidential Rank of Distinguished Executive in 1988. O'Brien received a BA degree from Niagara University and a Juris Doctorate degree from Georgetown University. During 1965- 66, he was a Princeton Fellow in Public Affairs at the Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs, Princeton University. He is a member of the D.C. Bar, Virginia State Bar, the Federal Bar Association, the American Bar Association, the International Bar Association and the International Institute of Space Law. ------------------------------ Date: 25 Jul 89 17:07:51 GMT From: cdaf@iuvax.cs.indiana.edu (Charles Daffinger) Subject: Beyond Neptune Ok, here's a far-fetched question.. My understanding is that after the Voyager II Neptune fly-by, Voyager will head out of the solar system. What possibilities are there for a slingshot around Neptune to send the probe towards Pluto (if it could catch the planet), or even slingshot it back towards the planets it had already visited for yet another look, eventually bringing it towards Earth? Let's get a little bit more carried away and say that we could capture the probe for analysis of anything which may have been carried back from encounters with the distant planets, such as microscopic dust from the outer planets. How possible would such a maneuver be? Are we lacking too much information on the planets to be able to calculate the trajectories? Alternatively, if Voyager II heads out of the solar system, how much longer will we be able to maintain radio contact? Will the probe be sending back information at that time, or will it be simply shut off and left to drift? -charles -- Charles Daffinger >Take me to the river, Drop me in the water< (812) 339-7354 cdaf@iuvax.cs.indiana.edu {pur-ee,rutgers,pyramid,ames}!iuvax!cdaf Home of the Whitewater mailing list: whitewater-request@iuvax.cs.indiana.edu ------------------------------ Date: 24 Jul 89 16:06:38 GMT From: mcvax!ukc!etive!bob@uunet.uu.net (Bob Gray) Subject: Re: space news from June 19 AW&ST, and Apollo-anniversary editorial In article <14479@bfmny0.UUCP> tneff@bfmny0.UUCP (Tom Neff) writes: >The UK will be sending a cosmonaut up in 1991 (oooh, where are you Eric >Blair!), they are not paying in SFr and although, with 13,000 >applicants[!], HMG has the luxury of making an acquaintance with Russian >a requirement, I don't believe the Soviets themselves impose it on >visitors. NO, No, No! HMG has nothing whatever to do with the sending of a UK cosmonaut to Mir. They have done everything they can to dismantle any British involvment with manned spaceflight as being "too expensive" and "a joyride at the taxpayer's expense". A group of companies have research they are wanting done in orbit, and with the extra funding raised by sponsorship, advertising and sales of TV rights, they will buy the launch they need from anyone who is selling. The only sellers so far are the Soviets. Please do not give any credit to the myopic penny-pinchers who seem to be doing their best to stamp out research and education in the UK. Bob. ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 25 Jul 89 13:58:01 PDT From: Craig Cholar <3432P%NAVPGS.BITNET@VMA.CC.CMU.EDU> Subject: Re: SPACE Digest V9 #552 >> This one I've wondered about for 20 years. There is the famous view >> of the moon's surface as the Eagle was landing. I suppose the >> pictures were looking out through the LEM's window. Just at landing, >> something that looks like a hand holding a needle-like object appears in >> the upper right-hand side of the picture and comes down across the window. >> What was that? What did it do? >> > >I believe that is the shadow of the antenna on top of the LEM on >the lunar surface. The needle like object is the antenna, and the >"hand" is the base of the antenna. Well, that's a good guess, but I think I have the real solution... Below each landing pad of the LEM there were long, fragile probes with sensors mounted at the tip. When the lunar surface was first touched by one of the probes a console light in the LEM would turn on so the the astronauts would know they were just about to land on the surface. In the recording of the Apollo 11 landing one can hear an astronaut (either Armstrong or Aldrin, I'm not sure which) say "Contact Light"; this is when the LEM first actually touched the surface of the moon, so technically these are the very first words spoken by men on another world. Why am I mentioning this? Because the shadow of one of landing legs (with the probe dangling beneath it) is the shadow seen coming down the screen in the landing film. The 'hand' is the wide foot pad at the base of the leg. >There is lots of footage looking backward as a stage separates and >falls away. The cameras that took these shots were mounted in other >stages that were eventually discarded as well. How were the pictures >from those cameras retrieved? ... I don't know how those fantastic 'rear-view-mirror' shots of the Saturn stages separating were done, either. I've been wondering about that for a long time, too. Craig Cholar, 3432P@NAVPGS ------------------------------ Date: 26 Jul 89 06:22:26 GMT From: agate!web%garnet.berkeley.edu@ucbvax.Berkeley.EDU (William Baxter) Subject: Cheerleading (was Re: Henry's (not Weinhards)) > Neff >> Miya >>> Neff In article <14487@bfmny0.UUCP>, tneff@bfmny0 (Tom Neff) writes: >In article <4466@eos.UUCP> eugene@eos.UUCP (The Miya-creature) emerges >from the NAS-cave and writes: >>Neff writes: >>>What's missing is getting down and dirty on the inner planets, in my >>>view. That's where the excitement lies. IMAX on a sample return and >>>rover mission! How bout it! >>Sounds great. Don't see a question mark. >That's because I'm cheerleading more than I'm honestly questioning. And you're admitting it! What an important revelation! Why don't you spare us the cheerleading noise and do some honest questioning. William Baxter ARPA: web@{garnet,brahms,math}.Berkeley.EDU UUCP: {sun,dual,decwrl,decvax,hplabs,...}!ucbvax!garnet!web ------------------------------ Date: 25 Jul 89 00:41:47 GMT From: pacific.mps.ohio-state.edu!ohstpy!pedro@tut.cis.ohio-state.edu Subject: Catch-A-Planet (More than a Summary) It looks like such an interesting topic as looking for planets around other stars died out. It's a shame. Let me summarize: Someone's original question was about the path described by a nearby star due to the gravitational influence of a planet. The right answer, given by several people, was that it would be some sort of wobble around the path described by the center of mass of the system. Just from memory, I made a summary of the methods to detect a planet: spectroscopy, infrared photometry, astrometry, and even by detecting intelligent life living on a planet. After all, there is a lot of serious groups looking for it, in several countries. I did not want to start an argument about this, but I thought it was a perfectly legal method. What I did not understand is what religion has to do with this, as someone pointed out. I thought it was radioastronomy. Anyway, I assumed that everybody was half-joking. On the interesting side we have some points that can be/have been made: 1. How hot should be an star not to allow life to develop on its planetary system? 2. Can a planetary system form in a very hot star? 3. Do we ALREADY have the techniques to detect other planets? Anita Cochran (sp?) said we are very close to it, at least from spectroscopy. Can anyone provide more updates? 4. HIPPARCOS is an astrometric satellite designed to measure high precision parallaxes. Will it be possible to look for planets using this satellite? ...and so on. So there we go. Post your answers or mail them to me and I'll summarize. If anyone is interested... Have a nice day, you humans. Pedro Pedro @ ohstpy.mps.ohio-state.EDU BITNET: Pedro @ ohstpy.bitnet ----------------------------------------------------------------- "I was very concerned about my significance in the Universe until I found out that each time I use my deodorant I enlarge the ozone hole" (R.Fontanarrosa, 1987). ----------------------------------------------------------------- ------------------------------ Date: 25 Jul 89 14:59:39 GMT From: stsci!berry@noao.edu (Jim Berry) Subject: Re: Space telescope - why only 1200 hours? From article <14486@bfmny0.UUCP>, by tneff@bfmny0.UUCP (Tom Neff): > In article <1989Jul24.213346.24486@cs.rochester.edu> yamauchi@cs.rochester.edu (Brian Yamauchi) writes: >>Why does [HST] really need to be LEO? Why not put it in a higher orbit? > HST is a very heavy payload designed to be serviced by the Shuttle, which > cannot visit orbits higher than about 300nm under any circumstances. Hence > it lives in LEO. Welcome to the joys of "manned presence in space." Actually, HST is a very LIGHT payload (it's mostly empty space, after all) and could be boosted fairly high (still LEO, though). The problem is that a 'service' flight would then require that the shuttle take off empty since any normal payloads would make it too heavy to get up to HST, so we can't even have a high low Earth orbit. -- ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Jim Berry | UUCP:{arizona,decvax,hao}!noao!stsci!berry Space Telescope Science Institute | ARPA: berry@stsci.edu Baltimore, Md. 21218 | SPAM: SCIVAX::BERRY, KEPLER::BERRY ------------------------------ End of SPACE Digest V9 #586 *******************