The Darkest Places on Earth

1.Chile's Atacama Desert- Observatorio Cerro Mamalluca
2.Mauna Kea, Big Island Of Hawaii- Altitude 9,000 feet - Keck Observatory, 30 meter telescope to be finished in 2018, Onizuka Visitors Center free nightly stargazing programs.
3.Sonora Desert- Kitt Peak National Observatory
4.Natural Bridges National Monument, Utah- First placed honored as International Dark Sky Park
5.South African Astronomical Observatory in Sutherland (some say also Capetown, South Africa)
6.Kruger National Park, SouthAfrica
7.Sossusvlei Desert Lodge, Namibia
8.Sydney Observatory, Sydney Harbor Australia
9.Uluru (Ayers Rock) Australia
10.Auckland Stardome, New Zealand
11.Mount John Obervatory, South Island Town of Lake Tekapo
12. Royal Observatory, Edinburgh Scotland
13. Galloway Forest Park, Scotland

Apophis- 13 year old boy corrects NASA

Apohis, a 390 meter wide asteroid was discovered in June 2003, and made headlines in December of 2004 because of its probability to impact Earth with the equivalent of 100,000 times the power of the Hiroshima bomb in 2029.

Then another story circulated the internet, though it was not collabarated by NASA. A 13 year old german boy said the trajectory did not take into account the probability of the Asteroid Apophis hitting our satellites and changing its trajectory during 2029, to again return and hit the earth on 2036. And that NASA miscalcuated its trajectory as computed for his shool science project. NASA afraid of ridicule , stated it was still sticking to its original estimate and that the probability was miniscule.

Apophis trajectory will be examined more closely in 2012 and 2013 and the trajectory will again be revised. This next rendezvous will give scientist a chance to examine its spin rate and brightness which will give us a more precise trajectory. The more radiation from the sun it absorbs the faster its trajectory and spin, giving it a slightly different trajectory over the course of years. We also need to take into account the pull of other objects on Apophis in space which can also change its path. If in 2029 it does go through earths precise gravitational keyhole thats 600 meters accros then it will return to hit us , 7 years later . If it is determined with certainty it will hit us in 2036 then we can do some things to change its trajectory. One proposed idea is to put large reflecting Mylar material that reflects sunlight to heat up the asteroid enough and change its course. Another proposed idea is to send a bomb to blow it up, but that may create more smaller Asteroids that will surely be attracted to earth gravitational pull. I bet this is best because if they break up into small enough rocks they will burn up in our atmosphere.

On the question given by the 13 year old -what about an impact in space with a man made satellite? if this occured it would be like a bug on a windshield and would only change its trajectory a few meters. If Apophis did hit the earth or even landed in the ocean there would be a large cloud of dust kicked up into our atmosphere from the impact that would be equivelant to an 880-Megaton bomb, the dust would last years , and the planet might experience a cooling effect and some crops will fail. All nearby coastlines would be obliterated. We should be able to see Apophis skim our atmosphere in 2029. an asteroid this size hits earth every 800 years, unless you count the Tunguska event of 1908, a mysterious explosion over Siberia (most likely an exploding Asteroid in our atmosphere) that packed as much energy as 10-15-megatons or the equivalent of 1,000 Hiroshima bombs or about 1/3 the power of the Tsar Bomba(the largest nuclear weapon ever detonated). So you can see a difference, the 15 Megaton Tungaska Meteroid or Bolide knocked over 80 million trees ,over 800 square miles of of forest. By contrast a 30 meter(30 feet) in diameter Asteroid has the same power as the bomb dropped on Nagasaki and we are hit with these more than once a year, but most explode or burn up in our atmosphere before causing any damage to our earth or us.The Brazilian Tunguska of 1930 which also burned and depopulated parts of the Amazon remains a mystery. In June 2002 a military satellite detected a 12 Kiloton explosion attributed to an Asteroid that remained undetected. Objects as small as the one that caused the Tunguska event are to small to detect by present day observations.Was this this Crater left by the tunguska event? Lake Cheko.

On September 15th 2007 A ball of fire exploded in a remote peruvian village. 600 Hundred people in Peru have needed treatment after an object from space - said to be a meteorite - plummeted to Earth in a remote area near Caracas in the Andes. People who visited the scene have been complaining of headaches, vomiting and nausea after inhaling gases. Even animals were falling ill. Alot of people in the area went to investigate the crash of the fiery ball of rock which was spewing toxic fumes like sulfur, methane and Arsnic from contact with ground water containing these chemicals . This was an unusal meteor in that by the time most meteors fall they are cold but this one was steamy hot when it hit the ground. Hundreds of people near the fallen meteorite have needed hospitilization after vomiting and stinging eyes. The crater it left was 30 meters wide by 6 meters deep.

The Pole Star/ The North Star

The North star is on the handle of the Little Dipper . The Little Dipper is also known as the Little Bear and URSA MINOR. Use the Two stars on the Big Dipper (also known as The Big Bear, URSA MAJOR) as pointers to the North Star. The name of the North Star is called Polaris. Polaris is in a group of stars called Cepheids which are in a later stage of their life and so pulsate in intensity . In 2010, Astronomers have recently seen Polaris brighten up after 100 years of seeing it fading away . This is the only star that appears stationary as all other stars appear to revolve around it. It is used for land/sea/air navigation.

Hammer and feather test

At the end of the last Apollo 15 moon walk, Commander David Scott (pictured) performed a live demonstration for the television cameras. He held out a geologic hammer and a feather and dropped them at the same time. Because they were essentially in a vacuum, there was no air resistance and the feather fell at the same rate as the hammer, as Galileo had concluded hundreds of years before - all objects released together fall at the same rate regardless of mass. Mission Controller Joe Allen described the demonstration in the "Apollo 15 Preliminary Science Report":
So you can drop an elephant and a feather and they too would reach the moon's surface at the same time.

Andromeda and The Clash of the Titans

The story starts with Acrisus king of Argos, being mad at his daughter Denae, and puts her and her infant son in a wooden box and sends them into the sea. The film Clash of the Titans retells the story of Perseus, Andromeda, and Cassiopeia, but makes a few changes (notably in the greek myth Cassiopeia boasts that her daughter is more beautiful than the Sea nymph named Thetis, but in the movie she is portraid as a godess instead of a Sea nymph. In the original greek myth Andromeda was a princess of Ethiopia, daughter of Cepheus and Cassiopeia. In the myth Thetis was a Nereid, but also the future mother of Achilles. Achilles was trained by Chiron who was a centaur. Thetis was married off to a mortal by the name of Peleus for fear her son would dethrone Zeus. In the movie Andromeda and Perseus meet and fall in love after he saves her soul from the enslavement of Thetis' hideous son, Calibos, whereas in the myth, they simply meet as Perseus returns home from having slain Medusa. In the movie Calibos - the spoiled son of Thetis, the goddess of the Sea - was a handsome young man destined to marry Princess Andromeda, the daughter of Queen Cassiopeia; thus, one day, he would become ruler of the rich city of Joppa and eventually all of Phoenicia. Zeus entrusted Calibos to care for the Wells of the Moon; Calibos instead hunted, trapped and killed everything that lived there, including Zeus’ sacred herd of flying horses, leaving only the stallion Pegasus. As punishment, Zeus transforms Calibos into a monster; thus he is shunned and forced to live as an outcast in the swamps and marshes. Calibos is an invented character for the movie. Thetis, furious at her son's fate, vows that if Calibos cannot marry Andromeda, then no other man will either. In the film, the monster is called a Kraken, but in greek mythology he is known as Cetus, although it is depicted as a lizardlike creature rather than a squid or a peaceful whale; and combining two elements of the myth, Perseus defeats the sea monster by showing it Medussa's face, turning the monster into stone. Andromeda is depicted as being strong-willed and independent, whereas in the stories she is only really mentioned as being the princess whom Perseus saves from the sea monster. In the film Zeus who is the father of Perseus and heracles is upset that Acrisus sent off his son into the sea.So he orders the Kraken to destroy Argos. Zeus is also known as Jupiter. Andromeda was a princess of Ethiopia, daughter of Cepheus and Cassiopeia.
Andromeda followed her husband to Tiryns in Argos, and together they became the ancestors of the family of the Perseidae through the line of their son Perses. Perseus and Andromeda had seven sons: Perseides, Perses, Alcaeus, Heleus, Mestor, Sthenelus, and Electryon, and one daughter, Gorgophone. Their descendants ruled Mycenae from Electryon down to Eurystheus, after whom Atreus attained the kingdom, and would also include the great hero Heracles. According to this mythology, Perseus is the ancestor of the Persians.

The darkest places in the USA

1.CAPITOL REEF, UTAH Red-rock expanses far from sizable human habitations.

2. BIG BEND, TEXAS An isolated corner of the United States that is a favorite of stargazers.

3. BRYCE CANYON, UTAH With high altitude and clear air, optimal for very dark nights.

4. DEATH VALLEY, CALIFORNIA Spectacular star vistas in the northern portion of the park, farthest from Las Vegas and Los Angeles.

5. GRAND CANYON AND GLEN CANYON, ARIZONA Good viewing in areas away from small towns and tourist facilities.

6. CANYONLANDS, UTAH Darkness diluted only by a few nearby towns threatening the night sky.

7. YELLOWSTONE, WYOMING National Park Service facility lights are being retrofitted to improve the night sky.

8. GREAT BASIN, NEVADA Distant glows of Salt Lake City and Las Vegas.

9. CAPE HATTERAS, NORTH CAROLINA Probably the darkest location on the Eastern Seaboard.

10. CRATER LAKE, OREGON Perhaps the darkest part of the Cascade Mountains. Was also known as the clearest prestine lake in the world.Fish recently introduced into the lake lowered its clearness.

Dark Asteroids

Asteroids as dark as Asphalt exist, they reflect 5-10% of sunlight, they are likely spent comets and pose no threat to earth.The near-Earth object, designated 2010 AB78, was discovered by WISE Jan. 12. The mission's sophisticated software picked out the moving object against a background of stationary stars. As WISE circled Earth, scanning the sky above, it observed the asteroid several times during a period of one-and-a-half days before the object moved beyond its view. Researchers then used the University of Hawaii's 2.2-meter (88-inch) visible-light telescope near the summit of Mauna Kea to follow up and confirm the discovery.

A strange x shaped object in space?

On january 29, 2010, Hubble discovered a mysterious X-shaped object traveling at 11,000mph. NASA says that P/2010-A2 may be a comet, product of the collision between two asteroids. It has baffled Astronomers could it be a spaceship slowing down from warp speed, Or coul it be a Klingon Bird of Prey?
This is pretty slow knowing the Space shuttle must travel at 25,800 miles an hour to escape earths' atmosphere, thats 10 times faster than a bullet.

Castor and Pollux and St. Elmos Fire

The Astronomy book I gave you will explain most of the basics, and this blog will serve as supplemental material. If you have any questions you can email me and I will post the best possible answer. Lets start this blog with the constellation of the Twins, Castor and Pollux (also know as Gemini)and how they relate to St. Elmos Fire. The constellation Gemini lies between Taurus and Cancer. St. Elmo is the patron saint of sailors and was known to guide them to safety. It is the phenomena that appears as bright lights at the tips of the masts of ships,poles,trees and even leaves, but are actually plasma brought on by the highly charged particles in the atmosphere tearing apart air molocules and usually started as the results of the suns coronal discharge, volcanic activity, or a thunderstorm. Through out history it has appeared to many famous people and have been associated with Pliny the Elder, Shakespeare, Herman Melville, Julius Ceasar, Constantine, Megellan, Columbus,Charles Darwin and millions of people around the world. These lights are associated with superstitious beliefs throughout various cultures, like when they appeared on the spears of Ceasars 5th legion, Julius Ceasar saw them as an omen to heavenly intervention. When it appears a one light it is called Helen, and when it appears as two lights they are called Castor and Pollux. If you look up the Carrington event or the solar super storm of 1859 you will see that this was the largest solar storm in recorded history and if a similar storm was to hit today it would fry most of our modern day electronics and thereby sending people and our world economy into chaos. This was the event in which millions of people around the globe witnessed first hand the effects of a CME (Coronal Mass Ejection) from the sun on our atmosphere by manifesting itself as Aurorea and St. Elmo's Fire. Aurorae even appeared in the equator which is rarely seen.

Now lets delve ito the actual stars. Sometimes when you see a star it appears as a bright dot in the sky , but peer into a telescope and it will reveal itself as having been more than one star, get an even more powerful scope and the will appear as even more stars. Sometimes the stars are so close together that no powerful telescope can distinguish their separation and that is where Spectroscopy will reveal these binary stars or eclipsing stars, and by checking the changing light spectrum we can tell if there is something passing in front of them. This would be like when you put your hand in front of a faint light on a candle in a very dark room, I cant see your hand in the dark but I know it is moving in front of the candle when I cant see the light. The star of Castor is an Orange Giant 34 light years from earth is just that, a star so far away that the light appears as one bright star when viewed with the naked eye. Castor can be seen through a telescope as a Visual Binary, but each of those stars have a companion star only revealed through spectronomy, so it is a quadruple star system, (two spectroscopic Binary stars). But wait if we look closer there is another faint star nearby gravitationally bound to these and it is an Eclipsing Binary , so now its a sextuplet star system . Recently through spectral analysis Pollux has been is confirmed to have an extrasolar planet.

Here is a little information on the origins of the constellation itself. Castor and Pollux were twin sons of Leda and Zeus/Tyndareus and brothers of Helen of Troy and Clytemnestra and half-brothers of Timandra, Phoebe, Heracles, and Philonoe. Pollux's father was Zeus and Castor's was Tyndareus. The chinese thought of Castor as Ying and Pollux as Yang as in the Ying/Yang Philosophy which is a state of being where everything is made equal by opposing forces and from which all things depend. This is like the battle between good and evil, light and dark, and positive and negative forces.

Will we see more of St. Elmo Fire during the next solar maximum of 2013. Maybe we will, so keep that camera ready to record the dazzling array of dancing lights or will your digital camera even work? See also Will-o-the Wisp, Ball Lightning , Foo Fighters, Naga Fireballs, Hessdalen Lights Red Sprites, Marfa Lights.Ball Lightning as a primordial mini black hole.

Have you seen a Bolide?

A Bolide is a meteor that has broken up into pieces in the atmosphere.Bolides are rare and are created when a meteor has developed cracks and is unstable. Bolides create a dazzling display of light as they plunge through the night sky.A meteor is consired a Bolide once it reaches a very bright level and then explodes.The Bolide I saw had a bright blue color and broke up in two, the blue color meant it was rich in certain elements. So when you look up to the sky during a meteor shower check out the color too because it can tell you about its compositon. Most meteor showers should be coming from a certain spot in the sky so their color might all be similar and because they come from the debris of a tails comet.So look up every night because you might see this rare sight called a Bolide.