NASA did a Live Stream event today (it might still be going on, not sure) to release the first official images taken by the Webb Telescope.
Spectacular is a massive understatement.
Yeah… color me dazzled. Thanks, Webb!
Tag: nasa
Monday Lunch Break
No spoilers here, but I think the one thing Marvel’s Hawkeye has taught us is that the universe needs a Kate/Yelena buddy cop show. There is supposed to be an Echo show coming and that could be a sort of Hawkeye spin off and if we don’t get a Kate/Yelena team up then we’re going to absolutely need a show of their own. Come on, Marvel/Disney+, let’s make that happen.
While we’re on the Marvel TV subject, let’s get going on Daredevil season 4, m’kay? Bring the whole gang back. They’ll have to tone down the blood for Disney+ viewers, but they can totally do it. Get it done.
While we’re on the Disney+ subject, The Book of Boba Fett launches in two days. I need this show to be amazing. I need it. I am not one of those Star Wars fans who think Boba Fett is the balls or anything. In three movies (from the point of view of the special editions) he’s on screen for a grand total of, what? 10 minutes? How many lines did he have? Was it more than two? There’s the “he’s worth a lot to me” line and the “put captain Solo in the cargo hold” and that’s all I can think of off the top of my head. He gets more in Attack of the Clones and in the The Clone Wars TV show (and Rebels too? I can’t remember, was he in Rebels? I don’t think so), but that’s him as a kid and not the ass kicking bounty hunter he’s supposed to be. He had a good showing in season two of The Mandalorian, but I need the new show to live up to the character’s hype and I don’t know if that is actually possible without bending the laws of physics.
What else is going on?
NASA gave us a gigantic Christmas Present with the launch of the James Webb telescope. I haven’t read up on any of the details yet, but I hear everything went well. I remember the launch of the Hubble though, and I remember those blurry photos. I won’t relax about Webb until we start seeing results. Hubble was in Earth orbit and we could send folks up to fix it. Webb will not be reachable by humans. It has to work on the first try. I’ll read up on the news when I get a chance, but I’m hoping we’ll keep getting good news.
The kids are still at their dad’s. They will come back here on Wednesday and then be here through the weekend, including New Years Eve and New Years Day. I cannot understate how happy that makes me.
Right then, it’s 2:00pm and I have to get back to work. Have a good afternoon, my readers and only friends.
From the Air
This morning I saw a tweet from someone who claimed that it was a fact that Mars does not have an atmosphere. A few minutes ago, while eating my PB&J lunch, I saw this:
Yes, Virginia, there is air on Mars. You will die if you breath it, and there isn’t a whole lot of it, but it’s there and there is enough to fly a drone.
Suck it, science deniers.
What Does Mars Sound Like?
NASA has answered an age old question: What does Mars sound like?
It sounds like a microphone without a wind screen and the fact that we can listen to it, even though there is basically nothing there, is one of the coolest things that has ever happened in the history of Earth.
OSIRIS-REx
NASA put a probe onto the ground on an asteroid and vacuumed up some samples to bring home.
Can you believe what humanity can do when it applies science?
Yup, looking at you climate deniers, antivaxers, flat earthers, etc, etc.
Project Apollo Archive on Flickr
I never post pictures from other people’s Flickr accounts, but today I am making an exception. There is a new account called Project Apollo Archive that is essentially a dump of unedited pictures taken by the NASA Apollo missions to the moon. All of the astronauts had cameras built into their suits so they could snap away as much as they’d like. All of the pictures are unedited scans of the original film.
I believe the word you’re looking for is WOW!
Here are just a few shots from one roll of film taken during the Apollo 12 mission.
It Worked
They did it! It worked! Success!
New Horizons has re-established contact with Earth. The mission worked! Bring on the close up pics! Pluto!
Oh, Hi There Pluto
(Im)Patiently Waiting
Well, New Horizons had it’s closest encounter with Pluto. It happened a couple of hours ago. All of the probes systems were tied up with it’s observations, so there was no communication with Earth during the flyby. That, plus the 4-5 hours it takes for messages to cross the 3 billion or so miles to Earth, means we won’t know for sure that everything worked until late this evening. I read somewhere that we don’t expect to receive any data until 8-9 O’Clock tonight. We know the spacecraft made it to Pluto. We won’t know for a while yet if it successfully completed it’s objectives. There is always a chance some thing could have gone wrong. Fingers crossed that everything went fine. For now, I will just wait impatiently for some news.
What the Hell is That Thing?
Dawn is at Ceres and one of these days the folks running the project are going to figure out just what in the hell those bright spots are. My guess is ice, but what the hell do I know?
Inside the Red Head's Head 