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The Planetary Society Blog
Archive
Archived posts are listed in reverse chronological order.
Dec. 15, 2009 | 14:05 PST | 22:05 UTC
Class announcement: How to play with Mars Express VMC images
Those of you who follow me on Twitter know that I've been fiddling with images from the Mars Webcam, more officially known as the Mars Express Visual Monitoring Camera (VMC), for the last couple of weeks. This camera is both awful and awesome. It... More»
Dec. 15, 2009 | 11:40 PST | 19:40 UTC
Planetary Society Advent Calendar for December 15: Mars
We have three orbiters and two rovers currently exploring Mars, each of which returns breathtaking photos on a daily basis. (Well, Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter hasn't been returning photos for months, but yesterday I learned via Twitter that the... More»
Dec. 15, 2009 | 10:25 PST | 18:25 UTC
No, they can't push with the arm to free Spirit
I've gotten this question about once a week since Spirit got stuck, but yesterday, two different readers asked the same question within an hour of each other, so I figured it was time for a blog entry.
The question: Can't they use the robotic arm... More»
Dec. 14, 2009 | 12:12 PST | 20:12 UTC
A teeny weeny bit of movement in Spirit's right front wheel
The ever-vigilant Doug Ellison of unmannedspaceflight.com just posted this animation, which really actually does show a teeny tiny bit of motion in the right front wheel. If you don't notice any motion, look closer. It's eensy, but it's there. ... More»
Dec. 14, 2009 | 10:09 PST | 18:09 UTC
Planetary Society Advent Calendar for December 14: The Moon
The Moon is the most familiar of the objects in the heavens. So it's kind of incredible to think about the fact that humans had never seen half of it until just fifty years ago, on October 7, 1959, when the Soviet Luna-3 returned the first images... More»
Dec. 14, 2009 | 09:22 PST | 17:22 UTC
Congratulations to the WISE team on a successful launch!
It was worth my while to get up at 5:15 my time this morning -- I saw a flawless launch of a Delta II from Vandenberg Air Force Base, carrying the Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer (WISE) into orbit. As I've described before in this space, WISE... More»
Dec. 13, 2009 | 15:35 PST | 23:35 UTC
Planetary Society Advent Calendar for December 13: Dactyl
If you don't think Pluto gets enough respect, just imagine what it's like to be a satellite of an asteroid. That is way, way down in the solar system food chain, the last thing anybody will claim deserves "planetary" status. So, in the spirit of... More»
Dec. 13, 2009 | 13:41 PST | 21:41 UTC
Copenhagen Needs More Space, Part 2 The Orbiting Carbon Observatory Must Fly Again
By Charlene M. Anderson
In our continuing saga of the Orbiting Carbon Observatory (OCO), the scene now switches from Copenhagen to Washington, D.C.
This week, a conference committee, made up of members of both the U.S. House of Representatives... More»
Dec. 12, 2009 | 14:17 PST | 22:17 UTC
Planetary Society Advent Calendar for December 12: Saturn
I've grown used to Saturn over the last five-plus years. Cassini's amazing cameras have set a new standard for the quality, sharpness, resolution, beautiful color, and all-around spectacularness of images returned from the outer solar system. ... More»
Dec. 11, 2009 | 13:54 PST | 21:54 UTC
Planetary Society Advent Calendar for December 11: Io
This is a special post for all of my readers who are lighting the first candle on their menorot this evening. I give you the solar system's candelabra, the innermost of Jupiter's Galilean moons, Io. Tugged among the gravitational pulls of Jupiter,... More»
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