dewline | Entries tagged with space exploration

I found out today - or was reminded today, I'm not entirely sure as I've downloaded resources from the IAU on the subject of star names in the past year and then neglected to review them carefully - that in 2015, a star in Monoceros - HD 45652 - was named "Lusitânia", in connection with their Name ExoWorlds programme. The one known planet orbiting it is named "Viriato". For the purposes of the projects I'm working on with the Tranquility Press fanfic gang, it's in Klingon space as of 2240-2410.

I love that this astronomical naming process is picking up speed in my lifetime!

Current Mood: geeky

He was Canada's first astronaut.

https://www.ctvnews.ca/montreal/article/marc-garneau-dead-at-76/

Current Mood: sad

So a new offshoot from my Tranquility Press fanfic map projects takes me rimward in the direction of Auriga, Taurus, Gemini, Cancer, Orion and so forth. The Hyades, Pleiades, the spinward side of Gorn-claimed space, rimward of the Klingons...and the Delta Triangle.

Created for the first animated Trek series episode "The Time Trap", it was a region known for the same kind of mysterious disappearances as Earth's Bermuda Triangle until Jim Kirk and company went digging around in the neighbourhood and found out where some of the vanishing spacecraft of multiple star nations across the centuries had ended up.

Based on material from Star Charts and Stellar Cartography, I picked out candidates for two of the three "anchor" stars of the Triangle, and now I'm working on filling in the surrounding neighbourhood with continued help from HYGMap.space...

Noting that, aside from Bellatrix, the other two stars I chose are not necessarily locked in. I'm open to alternative candidates.

Excerpt from star map designed by Dwight Williams for the Edge of Midnight fanfiction project.

Excerpt from star map designed by Dwight Williams for the Edge of Midnight fanfiction project.

Current Mood: nerdy
Current Location: Home-for-now

I went looking and it turns out that Jérôme Lalande's star catalogue has been preserved and translated to English.

Having since discovered by such means that Lalande 8 - from John M. Ford's Star Trek novel The Final Reflection - is in fact a real star, I am now trying to find out what names or catalogue numbers that star is currently best known by. Any suggestions on the matter? Apparently, as of 1847, it was deemed to be in the constellation Cassiopeia?

Current Mood: nerdy

So this was published in the Astronomical Journal this month:

https://doi.org/10.3847/1538-3881/ad34d5

I found out via TrekBBS. As I noted in one of my replies: we still need to keep in mind that Star Trek is as much alt-history as space adventure. All those extra nebulae, the existence of ETI confirmed, and so on...

Current Mood: nerdy

As of this date?

NASA Exoplanet Archive: 5,599
Exoplanet.eu: 5,649

I suspect that both services will break the six-thousand mark this year. Just not sure of exactly when that will happen for each of them.

Current Mood: nerdy

1. From The Atlantic's Science Feed: Transparent wood?

2. Our galaxy is stealing stars?

3. X-Ray binary stars are real.

Current Mood: busy
Current Music: The House on CBC Radio

Noticing a lot of attention being paid to said planet's atmosphere care of the JWST this week.

Current Mood: pleased

Noting this for ongoing discussion...and Musk is clearly enmeshed in this particular mess, by our settler-nations' encouragement.

https://apt613.ca/space-is-part-of-the-land-indigenous-knowledges-and-colonization-by-light-and-satellite-pollution/

Current Mood: busy
Current Location: Home-for-now
Current Music: The Current on CBC Radio

Some of the wreckage of that space shuttle has been found.

Current Mood: melancholy

https://twitter.com/SpaceflightNow/status/1578129321553788947

Current Mood: bouncy

If anyone had told me when I was a child reading astronomy atlases that I would live long enough for images such as these to become available to the average human beings of any and almost all countries, I might have laughed. Or maybe not. I was already a fan of Space: 1999 and Star Trek by the time I hit grade 4.

And now we're here. At this point. It's happened.

Current Mood: enthralled

Yeah, I saw on YouTube that the launch this morning was scrubbed.

Looking forward to the next attempt. Soon, please?

Current Mood: busy

Canadian Press via CBC News: Canada invests $100M in 'historic' action plan for 2SLGBT communities

I understand why "2S" is being put first in this version, because of Indigenous history and concerns. Expecting pushback from the usual suspects anyway.

CBC News: NASA's massive moon rocket poised to launch Monday morning

Yes, I am excited by this. I expect that I'll have CBC coverage running tomorrow morning during my job search rituals. Or I might actually watch that coverage.

Current Mood: busy
Current Music: Cross-Country Checkup on CBC Radio

So.

Today is that anniversary.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yuri_Gagarin

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vostok_1

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yuri%27s_Night

Respect to his memory.

Current Mood: Hopeful in spite of pain

I first got word via Chris Hadfield's Twitter account:

https://twitter.com/Cmdr_Hadfield/status/1511775714391085070

Further details here:

https://www.space.com/canadian-astronaut-bjarni-tryggvason-obituary

For the record, I never got to meet Mr. Tryggvason. What I know of him, I know from second- and third-hand accounts.

Current Mood: melancholy

Wow.

It's been that long since THAT anniversary!

The day that planets orbiting other stars went from long-anticipated theory to confirmed fact.

https://twitter.com/DaleFrail/status/1480159110725308416

Update 12 Jan 2022: And I'd forgotten that the first two - and a third later discovered - and their host star all got names in 2017.

Current Mood: pleased

This morning, I tried to watch the launch of the new space telescope on YouTube, but it turned out I missed the launch time by about seven minutes. I still got to see enough to make me quietly happy for most of the rest of the day.

The household range is having problems. The heating elements on top are still working just fine for frying, steaming and boiling, but the burner box - the oven - is not in good shape. I'd call the process of heating anything "sluggish" if anything. We're not sure what's caused that, and calling for help is naturally Problematic right now. So cooking lasagna was cancelled in favour of relying upon Pizza Pizza last night.

My day job is on hold until after New Year's due to lack of people available to supervise.

*shrugs*

More as it comes to mind...

Current Mood: calm
Current Location: Home-for-now
Current Music: "Radical Early Discovery" - RED Soundtrack

Phil Plait does a write-up on a planet orbiting a tight-orbit binary star system. Of course, there's a deep-cut Star Wars comment in there...

TIC 172900988 is the simplest catalogue number on file for that star right now. Here are the others on file at SIMBAD:

TYC 2483-160-1
2MASS J08343881+3133147
Gaia DR1 709709089004925440
GSC 02483-00160
Gaia DR2 709709093301608448

Note: For Trekkers' purposes, it's 800 light-years away, viewed in the constellation Cancer from here on Earth. So I guess that puts it well past the Klingon holdings...?

https://exoplanets.nasa.gov/exoplanet-catalog/7989/tic-172900988-b/
https://exoplanetarchive.ipac.caltech.edu/overview/TIC%20172900988
http://exoplanet.eu/catalog/tic_172900988_(ab)_b/

Current Mood: Nerdy-busy

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On the DEWLine 2.0: Dwight Williams

Entries tagged with space exploration

Star Trek Mapping: Mapping Rimward Systems - A Surprise in Monoceros

RIP: Marc Garneau

Trek Fan Mapping, Continued: Five Projects Now

Trek Fan Mapping, Continued: Around the Delta Triangle Part 1

ASTRONOMY: Lalande 8 AKA...?

Trek Fan Mapping, Continued: "The Death of Vulcan"?

Exoplanet Count

Assorted Items of Interest - 9 December 2023

Space: Exoplanet WASP-39B

"Space is Part of the Land"

As regards the Challenger Seven

Space Station: Dragon Endurance Arriving

Space: Exoplanet Weather Images

Space: Artemis, Delayed

News: Not-so-random stuff towards the end of August 2022

Yuri's Night 2022

RIP: Bjarni Tryggvason, Canadian Astronaut

Exoplanets: The Wolszczan-Frail Pulsar Planet Anniversary

Flight and the Quiet Happy

Exoplanets: Maybe Ohann?