Category: Space Travel
Science and entertainment are blending again, as James Cameron, director of Avatar, is now working with NASA. He’s been everywhere lately, spreading his message of stopping the rainforest destruction and environmental degradation. We loved Avatar, and it’s great that he is following it up with lots of interviews explaining the message of the movie and he even knows quite a bit about climate change. (Sigourney Weaver has also done some interviews on the rainforest and ocean.)
Cameron was at last week’s climate rally in Washington, he was on Democracy Now, on other radio and TV talk shows, and now he’s even helping out NASA. They are in development sessions for the new Mars rover, Curiosity, and Cameron will be helping them design the 3D camera. Here’s the story from Information Week.
James Cameron is working with the space agency to outfit the next-generation rover, Curiosity, with 3D cameras.
NASA is getting help from Hollywood director James Cameron to build 3D cameras for the next Mars rover, Curiosity.The space agency abandoned plans to build cameras with the capability for the rover in 2007 due to budgetary concerns.
That prompted the director ” known for blockbuster films Avatar and Titanic– to step in and personally petitioned the agency to build the cameras, according to NASA. The agency this month said it has delivered the last two of four science cameras — called Mastcams — for the rover without 3D capability.
Aren’t you glad we have an atmosphere?
This meteorite was seen in Wisconsin on April 14th, 2010. This video was taken by a dashcam on a police car.
Today, President Obama announced the end to the space program as we know it, and the beginning of a “new one”. I’d prefer new shuttles with bigger windows, but that is not to be. Obama spoke at Kennedy Space Center in Florida to “discuss the Administration’s goal to seek new frontiers for human space flight. The President declared that he is “100 percent committed to the mission of NASA and its future,” and laid out steps and investments that the Administration is making towards space exploration.” Older astronauts were none too happy with Obama prior to this speech. They thought he was giving up on the space program, and it sounds like he’s not going to do that at all. But landing on an asteroid is a priority? We should be building a base on the moon and going from there. I’m not sure what throwing a few billion $$$ on an asteroid landing is going to accomplish. I also don’t think that leaving spacecraft building and flying up to private corporations is a great idea.
This is from WhiteHouse.gov:
[President Obama] announced a $6 billion increase in NASA’s budget over the next five years, focusing on making cuts elsewhere as the government instituted a freeze on discretionary spending. The President said that this investment will increase exploration of the solar system and also Earth-based observations that will increase our understanding of the world and its climate in order to protect the environment for future generations.
I heard this interview on Coast to Coast radio a few nights ago and now that it’s on Youtube everyone can hear it. The government program HAARP is truly a frightening concept, and hardly anyone is aware of what our government is really doing with this technology. Listen to this interview with Dr. Nick Begich, a very sane man, and find out.
“Appearing for the full 4 hour show, lecturer on new technologies, health and earth science-related issues, Dr. Nick Begich, discussed the latest updates on HAARP technology, as well as the rapid advances in mind effects and enhancing ESP potentials. The HAARP facility in Alaska, covering many acres of land, has 180 72 ft.-tall steel antennas that are fed radio frequency energy that is concentrated and manipulated to “literally couple with the ionosphere or magnetic field lines surrounding the Earth,” he explained.”
Part 3
There are several more installments. You can find all the rest of it here.
I would love to be up there right now on the Colbert Treadmill looking up at the stars (or down at the earth) through the gorgeous new observation window.
ISS “Bay Window” Now Open On World.
Let There Be Light
Endeavour pilot Terry Virts opened the windows of the newly installed cupola one at a time early Wednesday, giving spacewalkers Robert Behnken and Nicholas Patrick an early look into the International Space Station’s room with a view that they had helped install.
The cupola’s fully opened windows look down on the Sahara Desert in this image that was ‘tweeted’ from space by JAXA astronaut and Expedition 22 flight engineer Soichi Noguchi.
This image is the first taken through a first of its kind “bay window,” a 7-pane cupola, on the International Space Station. Viewed is the Sahara Desert.
(Big file -- click for larger version)
The Hubble photos literally see light back in time, which makes these photos from a real time machine. Below are some more Hubble photos from last year, though not as recent as the galaxy photos.
