Blogs

John Wheeler, the great physicist who coined the term "black hole", passed away yesterday: http://cosmicvariance.com/2008/04/13/goodbye/

http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?id=pioneering-physicist-john-wheeler-dies

Good pass of the space station tonight (Thu Apr. 10) at 9:11pm in the west northweest.

Now is a good time to observe Saturn - next year the planet is headed for a ring-plane crossing so we won't get as good of a view of the rings as we do now. Here's a nifty online doo-dad that can help you observe the brighter satellites of Saturn:http://www.skyandtelescope.com/observing/objects/planets/3308506.html?page=1&c=y

Note a group of small sunspots have just come onto the disk. They're not visible to the naked eye but might be nice with a white light or H-alpha filter.

Note there will be a nice pass of the ISS and the Jules Verne spacecraft tomorrow (Wednesday night).See:http://tinyurl.com/3akj65The AT (aka Jules Verne) will precede the station by a couple minutes.

I was busy in Michigan this week...didn't notice the big glow in the sky LOL...

But here's a several billion year old gamma burst that occured well before the Earth existed!

http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2008/21mar_nakedeye.htm?list880574

Rolling Rock is running ads telling people to go outside on March 21 to watch their logo projected on the Moon with lasers. See: www.moonvertising.com
 
Note this is a hoax. The lasers needed to bounce off the bare surface of the Moon would need to be too powerful for safe use. (The Moon's albedo is only 12%).

Does anyone have a sure fire way of collimating a 5" Celestron Schmitt Cassegrain without spending a fortune?

Test blog, blah blah blah!

Well, I never blogged before. It's kinda late for me, so I hope I spelt blog in past tense correctly. It looks OK.

Adrain and I just spoke on the phone about content. I think someone educated in the science of astronomy should help with the categories. The front page could be anyone, but it needs editing to make sure it sounds sensible.

My sleep will help you. Good night!