LCROSS to crash into the moon on Friday morning

Howard reminds me that LCROSS is scheduled to impact the moon on Friday.

Astronomy Service Slooh Will Let You Watch The LCROSS Impact Live On October 9 at 7:30am EDT.

"The Lunar CRater Observation and Sensing Satellite will hit the moon to created a crater 14 meters in diameter and 2 meters deep. The resulting analysis will help assess how large bodies will damage planets along with an assessment of current water levels in the moon. Plus it involves blowing holes in the moon."

I have been following LCROSS on twitter since its launch. It tends to post quippy remarks about its position and snippets of traveling songs and moon songs. For instance:


These song quotes are from Ticket to the Moon by ELO.

This quote is from the Grateful Dead song, Yellow Moon. This is the tweet that started me worrying about LCROSS's sanity. It's the kind of thing a computer would say before it took over the laboratory and started killing everybody.


Quotes from Space Truckin' by Deep Purple.


LCROSS's nightmare above is courtesy of Bat Out of Hell by Meat Loaf.


I have this song on my iPod, "Fly Me To the Moon", the Frank Sinatra version.


I also have this song on my iPod, "Destination Moon", the Dinah Washington version on Ultra-Loung Vol 15: Wild Cool and Swing' Too. The other quote is from Tambourine Man by Bob Dylan.

I have now become invested in its fate and I will be sorry to see it crash into the moon.

I realize that whoever is posting for LCROSS is trying to generate interest but having a twitter feed to which anthropomorphisizes a device destined for destruction is getting to me a little. Especially since the discovery of water on the moon by other means may make its destruction fruitless. It claims that it isn't doomed but on a heroic mission like some that have gone before:


Perhaps I am felling a little maudlin.

(other moon songs can be found here.)

The day after moon day when the world read the headlines

July 21, 1969 was the day when the world woke up to the headlines of man landing on the moon, though millions watched it live as it happened.

NASA has many great photographs in their history write up of the Apollo 11 mission.



Above is the iconic photo of Buzz Aldrin with Neil Armstrong and LM in reflection in Aldrin's visor. I have linked to Wikipedia's photo with black sky behind Aldrin made by extending this picture vertically, but the original shown here shows that the photo was cut off at the top. Still not a bad photo for being shot by Neil Armstrong in a space suit on the moon without a viewfinder to look through.

Because Neil Armstrong took so many of the pictures during the mission there are only a few photos of him on the moon. The one above is one that Buzz Aldrin took.

Here is another one of Neil Armstrong that has been taken from a high definition restoration of 16mm film taken by a camera on top of the lunar module. You can even see Armstrong's face through his visor. This picture is featured in a new book about the moon landing.

Finally the big blue marble with the Lunar module below.


Let's go back!

Happy Moon Day - First photograph of man on the moon published in color

This first photo of man on the moon published in color was a supplement to the Philadelphia Inquirer 40 years ago.

My parents saved this photo with the other newspapers from the moon landing forty years ago. It is too large to scan in, so I photographed it. Click on it for larger to read the text and see more detai, though the photo was not that detailed originally.

Now NASA's Lunar Reconnaissance Observer has photos of the landing sites 40 years later.

Apollo 11

Apollo 14

Wish I was planning my moon vacation right now. Maybe in another 40 years. Tom Wolfe thinks he knows why we those first steps heralded the end of the program. Charles Stross asks what has the space program done for us? (lots of good stuff).

Let's go back.

40 years ago, Man on the Moon headlines from the Philadelphia Inquirer and the Norristown Times Herald

I was told today that 40 years ago when Apollo 11 landed on the moon and Neil Armstrong was about to take his historic first step I was crawling around on the floor with my twin sister and my father during the broadcast. I suppose at six months old I was too young to remember the moon landing but my dad tells me I was there watching.

My parents saved the newspapers from the Philadelphia Inquirer and the Norristown Times Herald for July 21, 1969 with the morning headlines proclaiming the landing and first steps of the night before. He are photos of those pages. If you click on them to make them larger you should be able to read some of the articles.

Philadelphia Inquirer July 21, 1969 page 1.

Philadelphia Inquirer July 21, 1969 page 3.

Philadelphia Inquirer July 21, 1969 page 3.
Closeup of conversation as Neil Armstrong takes his first step on the moon.

Philadelphia Inquirer July 21, 1969 page 4.

Philadelphia Inquirer July 21, 1969 page 5.

Norristown Times Herald July 21, 1969 page 1.

The Jupiter, Venus and Moon Show

Howard reminded me that tonight is a rare conjunction of Jupiter, Venus and the Moon tonight. I needed a tripod to get the shot because my hands are so shaky. This half second exposure taken at 6:30pm washes out the moon a little but lets you see the planets better. Venus is the bright dot at the bottom and Jupiter is the less bright dot on the right. I was afraid I would miss it because of the rain earlier this evening, but the rain stopped and the clouds moved away sufficiently. What really stopped my observations was the setting of these three into the treeline.

I wonder what myth that the Romans or Greeks could spin out of a conjunction of the love goddess Venus(Aphrodite) and a moon goddess, Luna (Selene) or Diana (Artemis) who replaced her, take your pick, with Jupiter (Zeus) the king of the Gods. Jupiter stories usually picture him chasing women so I am sure it would be interesting. Zeus had a child with Selene in the Homeric myths, but Artemis is Zeus daughter, and sworn to virginity. Venus is also a daughter of Jupiter but she is all about love. Probably it would be a myth about an argument.

Total Lunar Eclipse pictures from northern Delaware

I was able to capture the first half of last night's total lunar eclipse with my camera. The moon was at such a good angle that I didn't have to go outside, which probably contributed to the number of pictures I took, if not to their quality. The angle was so good that if I slept with my head at the foot of my bed I wouldn't have even needed to get up to watch it. That's my kind of astronomy.


Here is a composite of the first half with the moon being covered. The second half with the moon being revealed was after my bedtime. I did change some exposure setting during the eclipse as the moon became less bright, and the last was taken with the tripod finally and was a much longer exposure to bring out the red of the moon. I think they turned out well considering the equipment and the photographer, the next step would be a much more expensive camera, lessons on how to use it, mounted outside on a tripod.



This picture, taken at the height of the eclipse, was taken with an 8 second exposure with me holding the camera as still as possible braced against the window frame. I wanted this one because I couldn't get an angle with the tripod with the moon, Saturn and Regulus from the consetallation Leo all in the same shot so I had to hold the camera myself. I still jiggled a little but you get the gist of it. Saturn is to the left and Regulus above (I think? Any comments or corrections?), click for a bigger picture.

Include links to your lunar eclipse pictures in the comments. Howard was watching too, maybe he has pictures.

(learn about Saturn, and Regulus in Leo)