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Astronaut capture Hurricane Frances from space



 
 
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  #1  
Old August 28th 04, 09:13 PM
Jacques van Oene
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Default Astronaut capture Hurricane Frances from space

Mike Rein

Kennedy Space Center, Fla.
August 27, 2004

(Phone: 321/867-2468)



James Hartsfield

Johnson Space Center, Texas

(Phone: 281/483-5111)



PHOTO RELEASE: P12-04



ASTRONAUTS CAPTURE HURRICANE FRANCES FROM SPACE



INTERNATIONAL SPACE STATION - This photo of Hurricane Frances was taken by
Astronaut Mike Fincke aboard the International Space Station as he flew 230
statute miles above the storm at about 10 a.m. EDT today, Aug. 27. At the
time, Frances was located 820 miles east of the Lesser Antilles in the
Atlantic Ocean, moving west-northwest at 10 miles per hour, with maximum
sustained winds of 105 miles per hour. Fincke, the NASA ISS Science Officer
and Flight Engineer, and Expedition 9 Commander Gennady Padalka are in the
fifth month of a six-month flight aboard the Station.


www.spaceflight.nasa.gov



-end-


--
--------------------------------------

Jacques :-)

www.spacepatches.info


  #2  
Old August 28th 04, 11:09 PM
bob haller
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ASTRONAUTS CAPTURE HURRICANE FRANCES FROM SPACE



INTERNATIONAL SPACE STATION - This photo of Hurricane Frances was taken by
Astronaut Mike Fincke aboard the International Space Station as he flew 230
statute miles above the storm at about 10 a.m. EDT today, Aug. 27. At the
time, Frances was located 820 miles east of the Lesser Antilles in the
Atlantic Ocean, moving west-northwest at 10 miles per hour, with maximum
sustained winds of 105 miles per hour. Fincke, the NASA ISS Science Officer
and Flight Engineer, and Expedition 9 Commander Gennady Padalka are in the
fifth month of a six-month flight aboard the Station.


www.spaceflight.nasa.gov



-end-


--
--------------------------------------

Jacques :-)

www.spacepatches.info




You dont need a astronaut to do something a unmanned weather satellite is
perfectly capable of...........
HAVE A GREAT DAY!
  #4  
Old August 30th 04, 02:21 AM
bob haller
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So astronauts shouldn't take pictures of hurricanes they happen to
pass over? Geez, Bob, get that stick out of your butt.

Brian


No not a problem but honestly its being done atomatically anyway.
HAVE A GREAT DAY!
  #5  
Old August 30th 04, 02:42 PM
Andrew Gray
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On 2004-08-30, bob haller wrote:

So astronauts shouldn't take pictures of hurricanes they happen to
pass over? Geez, Bob, get that stick out of your butt.


No not a problem but honestly its being done atomatically anyway.
HAVE A GREAT DAY!


Although, one might surmise, not very well.

ISS crew time is valuable, at least in the sense that the limited number
of available man-hours are oversubscribed. Yet, if you look at the ISS
status reports, every day they list photographic targets, often of
developing situations (hurricanes, wildfires) or of specific obscure
opportunities ("ah, an early-morning pass to the west of Bermuda, the
phytoplankon guy wanted that") - and often interesting but unplanned
targets of opportunity are found.

Why do they do this? If these images are being taken elsewhere, surely
the crew has better things to do?

One of the important lessons from Skylab was that the science return
with a person in the loop - the specific case being sun-observations -
was immense; a trained observer could *tell* when something interesting
was happening, and start paying attention. Analysts remarked that,
almost without fail, when a flare began or a prominence started
misbehaving, bang, every instrument hitting directly on it immediately.
This sort of flexibility just doesn't happen with machinery - you don't
need to put large amounts of effort and planning into arranging specific
images can be taken, just find a time the station is nearby and let the
crew do the work - trivial for a person, hard for a servo.

It is also worth remembering that a human, with a reasonable field of
view, is *far* more effective at off-track photography than a satellite
is; simply by having a person holding the camera, able to track it
around and lean to the side, &c &c, the amount of land you're able to
cover is vastly increased on any one pass - and when imagery is
time-dependent, this really does help.

Basically, earth observation *can* be done remotely - and is, very well
- but for non-routine work, looking for specific unusual targets, a
human photographer works better every time. If they were doing routine
mapping, it'd be a valid objection, but they're not... perhaps a
suitable analogy would be comparing a CCTV network to a security guard.
Your camera can see a lot, but they're not very flexible and there's
limits to what they can do; a wandering guard can see things, think,
investigate oddities as they arise without needing to compromise other
usages. They work very well *together*, and this is the case here...


--
-Andrew Gray

  #6  
Old August 30th 04, 04:09 PM
John Doe
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ISS crew time is valuable, at least in the sense that the limited number
of available man-hours are oversubscribed. Yet, if you look at the ISS
status reports, every day they list photographic targets, often of
developing situations (hurricanes, wildfires)


Another argument to allow the crew to spend some time is that being stuck in a
tin can for 6 months with limited opportunities to look outside, it is perhaps
part of their daily "requirements" along with exercise food, hygiene and
sleep. If you're going to stick a crew member next to a window for X minutes
per day to maintain his sanity, you might as well have him hold a camera and
do something useful while he enjoys the view.
  #7  
Old August 30th 04, 06:08 PM
Andrew Gray
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On 2004-08-30, John Doe wrote:
ISS crew time is valuable, at least in the sense that the limited number
of available man-hours are oversubscribed. Yet, if you look at the ISS
status reports, every day they list photographic targets, often of
developing situations (hurricanes, wildfires)


Another argument to allow the crew to spend some time is that being stuck in a
tin can for 6 months with limited opportunities to look outside, it is perhaps
part of their daily "requirements" along with exercise food, hygiene and
sleep. If you're going to stick a crew member next to a window for X minutes
per day to maintain his sanity, you might as well have him hold a camera and
do something useful while he enjoys the view.


I kept reminding myself to add that point at the end, and forgot -
thanks :-)

Yeah, it's quite true; as we explained to Bob earlier, providing
crewmembers with entertainment/relaxation is an important part of the
human factors planning attendant on having a crew at all, and this
allows us a method which combines an activity crews tend to enjoy (and
often not consider "work" as such, which is itself valuable) with
something that has undeniable science return.

--
-Andrew Gray

  #8  
Old August 31st 04, 12:09 AM
EAC
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It's correct that that a person can take a photograph with more art,
but it should be noted that weather satellite done things routinely
and is capable of capturing a specific unusual anomaly during its
routine, and it's also capable of focusing on the target if it had the
capability to do that. Without the automatons working, a human might
have easily missed that specific unusual anomaly, because humans are
lousy doing routine stuff.

The correct method is... the automatons done things routinely, then
when the automatons sense something is unusual or the human that
operate it sense something is unusual, then a real person can
investigate that anomaly, either using the automatons or directly by
himself. And that's what happen when an astronaut aboard the I.S.S.
took a picture of a hurricane, he was notified by the weather
satellite and then decided to take a picture of it. Though any weather
satellite is capable of doing what Fincke did. Really, you don't need
him. Keeping him up there would only torment him, unless of course one
want to torment him.



As for the CCTV analogy.

Well, considering that by now CCTV basically covered pretty much of
the public area (of course, they can put a camera in the bathroom
without people knowing), you don't need to have a security guard
wandering around that might alert a potential intruder, as matter in
fact, a CCTV network can catch an intruder better because they're more
capable of being stealthy than a security guard.

The only thing a security guard does now is to routinely patrol to
check if the CCTV network is working correctly, and to investigate any
anomaly that the CCTV network catch.

And even now there are robot security guards that regulary patrol to
investigate things.



As for on whether or not is right the astronaut took the picture of
Earth.

That depends.... Did the astronaut took it in his time off? Then if he
did, it's none of one's business, unless of course that any picture
taking of the Earth require a permission from the authority. Don't
laugh, it's true that you need a license, we can't take a picture of
Earth without the authority agreeing, and even more if the picture
goes public (or else we would have seen more U.F.O. photos from
space).

If the astronaut took the picture during his duty, then we should ask
if he did get the permission to took a break from his duty or was it
his duty to take a picture?
  #9  
Old August 31st 04, 12:21 AM
bob haller
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Yeah, it's quite true; as we explained to Bob earlier, providing
crewmembers with entertainment/relaxation is an important part of the
human factors planning attendant on having a crew at all, and this
allows us a method which combines an activity crews tend to enjoy (and
often not consider "work" as such, which is itself valuable) with
something that has undeniable science return.

--
-Andrew Gray


you have a good point and I agree.


HAVE A GREAT DAY!
 




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