DVD of
'Cosmic Casualties' Now Available
Doug Ellison flew in from the U.K. for IYA 2009 to give one of the most
fascinating lectures in the history of Astronomy Ireland on February 9th and now
it is available on DVD for everyone in Ireland to own and watch.
Doug took the crowd through a whirlwind tour of the highs and lows of
unmanned space travel over its 50 year history, starting with the Cassini
mission which was, coincidentally, the subject of our New Year lecture by
Professor John Zarnecki (which is also available on
DVD)
Doug reminded the crowd of the problems on the Cassini mission where nobody
allowed for the Titan probe's frequency changing due to Doppler effects which
would have meant no pictures or data would have been received. Also, someone
forgot to turn on one of the radio transmitters but fortunately Earth based
receivers were upgraded in time. Apparently even giving the world's greatest
scientists two billion dollars doesn't guarantee perfection.
He then went on to describe the Galileo mission to Jupiter, where the giant
communication dish failed to fully open and the 130,000bps (bits per second) of
data was diminished to a paltry 10 bps, reducing the information received by a
factor of over 10,000. Engineers, through their ingenuity, compressed data and
focused cameras on smaller areas and managed to get back nearly all (70%)
of data.
Also discussed were the Mars rovers, Spirit and Opportunity, who have been
trekking across the face of Mars for over 5 years despite being given life spans
of only 3 months. Doug has personally viewed all 200,000 photos sent back from
these rovers and delighted in wowing the audience with the panoramic views of
Mars that have been taken over the years, using special software for his
presentation.
Doug's knowledge was encyclopaedic and his enthusiasm for all these
missions was infectious, which the crowd shared, laughing and ultimately
delivering a thunderous round of applause.
Doug was interviewed on Phantom FM today, and you can hear
him
here
We are delighted to make the DVD of this lecture available to everyone
in Ireland to make this a truly national event.
2. An
Post
Astronomy Ireland are
helping An Post promote their astronomy themed
writer's competition for
primary schools around the
country called the 'What's the Story?' challenge.
They would welcome
contact from schools which are interested by March 6th and you can contact them
at (01) 7058400 or www.anpost.ie/educationawards
3. Comet Breaks Naked Eye Visibility
Barrier
Martin
McKenna from County Derry reports seeing Comet Lulin with the naked eye last
weekend. As explained in our last email the comet will be brightest at the end
of this month and we want you to email your own sightings to observe@astronomy.ie so we can record
them for posterity in our magazine. For a star map and full details of viewing
Comet Lulin subscribe to our magazine here. Remember, there is loads to
see this month: Venus now at its best for 3 years,
Saturn now at its best for 30 years, Naked Eye
Comet Lulin, and countless deep sky objects visible in these long
dark winter nights, so get out observing every clear night. For FREE
advice on what to see please call our Telescope Shop on (01) 847 0777 (full time
staff are available to advise you six days a week!) and see the Sky Diary pages
of our magazine every month.