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Sky & Telescope News Bulletin - July 18, 2003
================================================== ====================== * * * SKY & TELESCOPE's WEEKLY NEWS BULLETIN - July 18, 2003 * * * ================================================== ====================== Welcome to S&T's Weekly News Bulletin. Images, the full text of stories abridged here, and other enhancements are available on our Web site, SkyandTelescope.com, at the URLs provided below. (If the links don't work, just manually type the URLs into your Web browser.) Clear skies! ================================================== ====================== MARS MEETS THE MOON Skywatchers got an early dose of "Mars Mania" on the morning of July 17th when the red planet made a dramatic pairing with the waning gibbous Moon in the predawn sky. Thanks to generally clear skies across much of the Eastern Seaboard, early risers found Mars perched just off the Moon's northern limb. The planet shone so brightly (-1.9 magnitude) that it was easy to spot despite its proximity to the nearly full Moon. Viewed through a telescope, Mars mimicked the Moon's gibbous phase and displayed a brilliant white cap at its south pole. Observers in southern Florida were poised for an even bigger celestial treat, as the planet briefly slipped behind the lunar disk for several minutes around 4:30 a.m. local time.... http://SkyandTelescope.com/news/article_1006_1.asp - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - SMALL ASTEROIDS = SMALL THREAT? Every time a rocky body whizzes past Earth, asteroid specialists brace themselves for a frenzied burst of "what-if" doomsday questions from the news media. But while the risk of the interloper striking our planet is usually vanishingly small, the longer-term prospects for all such near-Earth asteroids are poorly known. Current thinking holds that objects 50 to 75 meters across, comparable to the one whose airburst devastated the Tunguska region of Siberia in 1908, probably come crashing down every 1,000 years on average. Most researchers think that objects twice that size, even though they arrive less often, probably strike the ground intact -- wreaking havoc locally if one should hit land and triggering an ocean-spanning tsunami if it makes a splash. But Philip A. Bland (Imperial College London) and Natalya A. Artemieva (Institute for Dynamics of Geospheres, Moscow) argue that the threat from small asteroids has been greatly exaggerated.... http://SkyandTelescope.com/news/article_1005_1.asp - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - COMET AWARD WINNERS FOR 2003 Five eagle-eyed individuals who were looking in the right place at the right time will share the fifth annual Edgar Wilson Award for amateur comet discovery. According to an announcement issued by the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory, the winners are Sebastian Hönig (Dossenheim, Germany) for discovering C/2002 O4; Tetuo Kudo (Kikuchi, Kumamoto, Japan) and Shigehisa Fujikawa (Mitoyo, Kagawa, Japan) for C/2002 X5; and Charles Juels (Fountain Hills, Arizona) and Paulo Holvorcem (Campinas, Brazil) for C/2002 Y1. All these discoveries were made during the calendar year ending June 11, 2003. Established in 1998 in memory of American businessman Edgar Wilson, the award is given only to amateur astronomers who, in a given year, find one or more new comets using amateur, privately owned equipment.... http://SkyandTelescope.com/news/article_1003_1.asp ================================================== ====================== HIGHLIGHTS OF THIS WEEK'S SKY * Last quarter Moon is on July 20/21. * Mars rises in the east-southeast shortly after the end of twilight. For details, see This Week's Sky at a Glance and Planet Roundup: http://SkyandTelescope.com/observing/ataglance/ ================================================== ====================== Copyright 2003 Sky Publishing Corp. S&T's Weekly News Bulletin is provided as a free service to the astronomical community by the editors of SKY & TELESCOPE magazine. Widespread electronic distribution is encouraged as long as our copyright notice is included, along with the words "used by permission." But this bulletin may not be published in any other form without written permission from Sky Publishing; send e-mail to or call +1 617-864-7360. More astronomy news is available on our Web site at http://SkyandTelescope.com/news/. ================================================== ===================== |
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Sky & Telescope News Bulletin - July 18, 2003
"Ron Baalke" wrote in message
... ================================================== ====================== * * * SKY & TELESCOPE's WEEKLY NEWS BULLETIN - July 18, 2003 * * * ================================================== ====================== Welcome to S&T's Weekly News Bulletin. Images, the full text of stories abridged here, and other enhancements are available on our Web site, SkyandTelescope.com, at the URLs provided below. (If the links don't work, just manually type the URLs into your Web browser.) Clear skies! ================================================== ====================== MARS MEETS THE MOON Skywatchers got an early dose of "Mars Mania" on the morning of July 17th when the red planet made a dramatic pairing with the waning gibbous Moon in the predawn sky. Thanks to generally clear skies across much of the Eastern Seaboard, early risers found Mars perched just off the Moon's northern limb. The planet shone so brightly (-1.9 magnitude) that it was easy to spot despite its proximity to the nearly full Moon. Viewed through a telescope, Mars mimicked the Moon's gibbous phase and displayed a brilliant white cap at its south pole. Hey, I was wondering what that was off to the side of the moon. I was up just before dawn and went out to get the paper. There was a moderate overcast and I could see no starts, but the moon was bright enough to see clearly through the overcast and off to the side was that other thing. I was so freaked out that I thought of asking in this newsgroup what the hell that was- but I then figured that whatever it was would surely be mentioned here. That was definitely a cool experience for me- something very different. It wouldn't have been nearly as impressive or even noticable to me if I had been able to see anything else in the sky- but to see just the moon and that other object was very cool indeed. JZ |
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