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The Planetary Society Blog
Archive
Archived posts are listed in reverse chronological order.
Sep. 2, 2009 | 09:25 PDT | 16:25 UTC
Dust storm update: Skies clearing for Spirit
For a while, Mars was beating Spirit while she was down, throwing a dust storm at the rover where it's bogged up to its hubcaps in fluffy soil. Although not nearly as bad as the dust storm of 2007, it did seriously darken Spirit's skies and reduce... More»
Sep. 2, 2009 | 08:55 PDT | 15:55 UTC
Station fire update: Mount Wilson safe, ready for "another hundred years" of science
Yesterday morning brought news of a relief in the weather for firefighters, and the staff at JPL returned to work. But it was a nail-biting time for those of us who have been monitoring the situation up on Mount Wilson, because live footage from... More»
Sep. 1, 2009 | 09:40 PDT | 16:40 UTC
Cassini goodies: Telesto, Janus, Prometheus, Pandora, F ring
As I mentioned yesterday, the Cassini raw images website has been full of goodies lately. Here's a sample.
(First, a quick update on the Station fire: Mount Wilson is still unscathed, and firefighters predict today will be a better day. Concern... More»
Sep. 1, 2009 | 08:00 PDT | 15:00 UTC
Planetary Radio Q and A: How do you make a mark on a planet made of gas?
This week's Planetary Radio features Linda Spilker on the current status of the Cassini mission and what it's been doing with equinox observations. On "Questions and Answers" I answered the question:
"How could an asteroid make such a big mark on... More»
Aug. 31, 2009 | 13:53 PDT | 20:53 UTC
What's up in the solar system in September 2009: MESSENGER's 3rd Mercury flyby coming up!
Tearing myself away from obsessive monitoring of the Station fire to do some real work: I'm going to make an attempt to make this a monthly feature, looking ahead to the next calendar month. Since it's been less than two weeks since my last one,... More»
Aug. 31, 2009 | 09:59 PDT | 16:59 UTC
Carnival of Space #118
Visit Cumbrian Sky, home of space poet Stuart Atkinson, for this week's Carnival of Space!... More»
Aug. 31, 2009 | 08:59 PDT | 15:59 UTC
Station Fire update: Mount Wilson Observatory still there, but still under threat
I've spent all weekend following the progress (if you can call it that) of the Station fire via every available medium, posting regular updates on Twitter and Facebook. Those have proved invaluable resources for concerned people to share links to... More»
Aug. 29, 2009 | 17:34 PDT | Aug. 30 00:34 UTC
The Station Fire is near JPL and even closer to Mt. Wilson
It's fire season again in Los Angeles, and this year there is a major fire burning in the mountains north of the city of La Cañada Flintridge, home to the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL). So far, JPL itself is not under any immediate threat,... More»
Aug. 29, 2009 | 07:29 PDT | 14:29 UTC
Chandrayaan-1 lost
It appears Earth is down one spacecraft. According to numerous reports in Indian media, contact was lost with the lunar orbiter Chandrayaan-1 abruptly -- in the middle of a communications session with Earth -- at 1:30 Indian time on Friday... More»
Aug. 28, 2009 | 14:01 PDT | 21:01 UTC
My Tweets this week
First off, I want to apologize for the fact that this'll be the only post today -- horrible air quality due to numerous Los Angeles area fires is making a bad cold more uncomfortable, and I have a bunch of September 1 deadlines on other... More»
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