Earthrise

40 years ago today the world got a first hand look at how small our home is compared to the vastness of space.

Earthrise was taken by astronaut William Anders on board Apollo 8 as it circled the moon on Christmas Eve, 1968.

Isn’t she beautiful?

From what I read, this particular conjunction of Venus, Jupiter and the Moon won’t happen for another 44 years. Here’s hoping I’ll be here for the encore!

I have to admit, if I had realized just how rare tonight’s gathering was I would have tried for a more scenic location than a city parking …

Here’s a link to a fascinating video. Taken from the space shuttle, this 10 minute video shows photos of cities at night from around the world. Check out the spoke based cities of Europe and how they contrast to the grid-based cities of the American west. The photos were taken using a …

My on again, off again interest in astronomy is on the rise again, and this time I plan to focus on an area that’s always held my interest, astrophotography. I’ve dabbled before, but never really engaged, but I think this time will be different. Rather than focusing on some telescope I wanted to …

Back when I was a kid we had nothing like modern weather radar systems to keep us informed about storms and heavy weather. As I recall, there was some trick involving tuning the TV (antenna, of course, no cable back then) to an unused channel; exactly how this was supposed to warn us of …

Though almost 10 years old, these fascinating photos were recently chosen as NASA’s image(s) of the day. This image is of Jupiter’s moon Io, and shows two sulfurous eruptions. The one in the middle has been visible in every picture taken since 1979.

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The Mars Exploration Rovers continue to function and provide useful scientific data more than two years after arriving on the Red Planet. Here’s a recent image showing Earth as seen from Mars; humbling, isn’t it?

Click the image to see a larger version.