Comet Hartley 2 close-up by EPOXI

Oh man, this is great. The radar images from last week indicated the comet was dog-boned shaped but the close-ups from the former Deep Impact/now EPOXI mission are great and confirmed the nature of this heterogeneous object. In other words, this looks just like some of the asteroids out there.


Credit: NASA / JPL / UMD / Emily Lakdawalla
Click to enlarge

Pits on the Moon

Phil Plait points out pits on the Moon!



Click to enlarge. Images via NASA/GSFC/Arizona State University/LROC

Today's sunny and windy weather

Click to enlarge to medium size. The link below goes to the really big image.
Today's weather in Chicago as seen from above via the MODIS imager on the Terra satellite. It was sunny and very windy with winds out of the southwest. It looks like you can see some dust streamers coming out off the lakeshore. Click on the link below for the huge 5200x6000 image with 250m resolution.

http://ge.ssec.wisc.edu/modis-today/index.php?satellite=t1&product=true_color&date=2010_09_07_250&overlay_sector=false&overlay_state=false&overlay_coastline=true§or=USA3&resolution=250m

Credits: http://ge.ssec.wisc.edu/modis-today/credits.html

ISS passes for the next ten days for Chicago

http://www.heavens-above.com/PassSummary.aspx?satid=25544&lat=41.781312&lng=-87.605097&loc=Chicago&alt=0&tz=CST

Moments in spaceflight

Soichi Noguchi captures a poignant moment as the Shuttle leaves the International Space Station. Click to enlarge to a higher quality image.

Moonrise from the ISS today

Evening ISS passes for the next few days in Chicago

http://www.heavens-above.com/PassSummary.aspx?satid=25544&lat=41.781312&lng=-87.605097&loc=Chicago&alt=0&tz=CST

4 Mar -2.4 19:27:17 10 WSW 19:30:00 44 NW 19:30:00 44 NW
5 Mar -3.3 18:17:05 10 SW 18:19:55 60 SE 18:22:47 10 ENE
6 Mar -2.2 18:42:14 10 WSW 18:45:00 41 NNW 18:47:31 12 NE
7 Mar -1.0 19:08:01 10 WNW 19:10:16 20 NNW 19:11:50 14 NNE
8 Mar -2.1 17:57:05 10 W 17:59:50 39 NNW 18:02:35 10 NE

It might actually be clear!

Live video feed from the International Space Station

This is great; I've been holding off on sharing this because I felt like it was too special to share widely. But here's the deal--there is a live video feed on the International Space Station. And usually it's pointing out at Earth. So literally you can watch the Earth go by live. You can experience sunrise and sunset in orbit. You can see the biggest cities' light pollution on the dark part of the orbit and sun glints of the Pacific or the swirls in the clouds in the Southern Ocean.

Here's the Live ISS video feed. If you stop the video, reload the page rather than restarting the video; otherwise regular NASA TV will start up.

See where the ISS is via http://www.heavens-above.com/orbit.aspx?satid=25544&lat=41.781312&lng=-87.605097&loc=Chicago&alt=0&tz=CST and http://www.n2yo.com
.

There are some parts of the orbit with no video download. It is also sensitive to the TDRSS capacity.

While writing this, I am watching sunrise on the ISS just south of South Africa. It is beautiful.

Re: Video of the day, rocket destroys sun dog

Regarding that SDO video, a friend points out another video of the same event:
http://www.spasmsofaccommodation.com/2010/02/sonic-boom-meets-sun-dog.html

Video of the day: rocket destroys a sun dog

Sun Dogs are bright refractions of the Sun coming from horizontal ice crystals in the atmosphere. The ice crystals are usually oriented horizontally because that it their stable falling pattern. Watch as the rocket carrying the Solar Dynamic Observatory pierces through a cirrus cloud and the sound waves from the rocket completely obliterate the preferred ice crystal orientation.

http://www.spaceweather.com/swpod2010/11feb10/anna-herbst1.mov?PHPSESSID=ndlp741nbtasb6f51eloa6dp81

Image of the day: Tethys

The saturnian satellite Tethys, imaged on October 14th, 2009. From the viewpoint of Cassini, the Sun was nearly directly behind the spacecraft when this image was taken.


Click to enlarge

Source: NASA/JPL/Space Science Institute

Martian swirly art

I am sure you've already seen this image from Mars of the swirly traces of dust devils removing the light dust from the darker surface. But here it is.


Click to enlarge to a 2560x1920 version
This is a dune field in a crater just off of Syrtis Major.

Links to other sizes.

November ISS sightings in Chicago

You can see the International Space Station in Chicago in the evening for the rest of the month. If schedules hold, you will also be able to see the Space Shuttle as it docks with the ISS, as the Shuttle should launch on the 16th.
Here's the next 10 days.

ISS at twilight

The International Space Station on September 11th, 2009, as viewed from Chicago. Click to enlarge.

Image of the Day: Mercury

This image of Mercury was taken yesterday, September 29th, 2009.


credit: NASA/Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory/Carnegie Institution of Washington

Here was Messenger flying past Earth in 2005: http://dwarmstr.blogspot.com/2006/04/messenger-departing-earth.html

And Mercury transiting across the face of the Sun from Earth: http://dwarmstr.blogspot.com/2006/11/mercury-transit.html

Early September ISS Shuttle passes in Chicago

See the International Space Shuttle and the Shuttle together in orbit here in Chicago:

http://www.heavens-above.com/PassSummary.aspx?satid=25544&lat=41.781312&lng=-87.605097&loc=Chicago&alt=0&tz=CST

Kepler

The Kepler mission is looking at this field of stars in Cygnus and Lyra. One of these stars will have an Earth-sized planet orbiting a star in the habitable zone.

Get this. This is the field. This is the image. Click on this 1000x1000 pixel image. Enjoy. Here is the medium resolution version. Enjoy a little more.

Now,
click on the full resolution. 11000x11000. 28 Megabytes. Now you see all the stars. Kepler is watching each one. All 4.5 million or so.


Kepler first light. Click on the image to make it bigger (and to start seeing the stars).

P.S. I originally wrote up the draft of this post two months ago and sat on it like I sit on everything. There is now a press conference coming up later in the week about early Kepler results.

ISS/Shuttle passes are over in Chicago

If you are searching for ISS and Shuttle passes over Chicago, tonight's was the last one for a while. If you are an early morning person, mid August will work; if not, early September is the next time you can see the ISS in Chicago.

Image of the day: Enceladus

Enceladus' north pole.


Click to enlarge to awesome.

via Planetary Society Blog.

Two awesome things you have already heard about

The LRO imaged most of the Apollo landing site on the Moon. Things will get better as the orbital parameters are modified.

There appears to have been an impact of some sort on Jupiter, first seen by an Australian amateur.