Category Archives: Astronomy

NASA ScienceCasts: What Exploded Over Russia?

February 26, 2013 TopSpacer

NASA’s ScienceCast program looks at what has been determined so far from studies of the asteroid that led to the meteor fireball over Chelyabinsk:

Amateur/Student Satellite, Astronomy, Space Systems

Canadian asteroid finder to be launched on Monday

February 24, 2013 TopSpacer

On Monday at 1226 GMT (7:26 a.m. EST), or 5:56 p.m. local time, India will launch six satellites on a Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle. The PSLV will lift off from the Satish Dhawan Space Centre on Sriharikota Island, which is India’s main launch site.

Included in the batch of satellites is the Canadian NEOSSat spacecraft, which has a small telescope that will be used to find Atira class asteroids, which orbit the sun entirely within the earth’s orbit: Asteroid Hunter: An Interview with NEOSSat Scientist Alan Hildebrand – Space.com.

NEOSSat will also scan for satellites and debris circling the earth.

NEOSSat was built by MSCI (Microsat Systems Canada, Inc), which previously built the MOST (The Microviability and Oscillation of Stars) microsatellite, a low cost spacecraft that is still in operation several years past its originally planned lifespan.

Here are two Canadian Space Agency videos about NEOSSat:

Astronomy, Events, Space Science

Video: Lessons from the Chelyabinsk meteor

February 23, 2013 TopSpacer

Here’s an interesting discussion [with Dr. David Morrison and Dr. Guy Consolmagno] at the SETI Institute about “What Lessons to Learn from the Chelyabinsk Meteor?”