Saturday, March 24, 2012

A Spacecraft Has Been Orbiting This Major Asteroid Since Last Summer

The Dawn spacecraft has returned some great photographs of the asteroid Vesta, such as this one showing the south pole. Vesta is 330 mile in diameter.
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13 comments:

  1. bornagain77March 24, 2012 at 7:48 PM

    Dr. Hunter, you may appreciate this lecture on Euler. I really enjoyed watching it.

    An Evening with Leonhard Euler – video
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h-DV26x6n_Q

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  2. Rebel ScienceMarch 24, 2012 at 8:24 PM

    130 miles in diameter, so not very massive. I wonder what the orbital velocity is and how far above the asteroid the spacecraft is orbiting.

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    1. velikovskysMarch 24, 2012 at 8:39 PM

      9,900 miles, try planetary society blog for good info

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  3. EugenMarch 24, 2012 at 10:04 PM

    velikovsky are you into amateur astronomy?

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    1. velikovskysMarch 25, 2012 at 10:33 AM

      Just a hobby, it is endlessly interesting and awe inspiring.

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  4. UnknownMarch 25, 2012 at 10:01 AM

    330 miles in diameter is a pretty big chunk of rock. Imagine what it would do if it hit us going at 50,000 mph.

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    1. ScottMarch 25, 2012 at 1:11 PM

      You might find this interesting..

      http://simulator.down2earth.eu/

      Also, see the Tunguska event, which is estimated to be the result of 60 meter comet.

      http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tunguska_event

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    2. UnknownMarch 25, 2012 at 2:18 PM

      Thanks, Scott, that's a really neat simulator.

      As an aside, one thing I remember was a scientist commenting on the CGI animations of such impacts in movies like Deep Impact and Armageddon. He thought they vastly underestimated both the brightness of such objects and the immense amount of heat they would radiate.

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  5. velikovskysMarch 25, 2012 at 10:31 AM

    Game over, the Chicxulub,which rubbed out the dinos, is estimated around 10 miles

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  6. EugenMarch 25, 2012 at 11:57 AM

    "Just a hobby, it is endlessly interesting and awe inspiring."

    Good for you. It's very frustrating to watch the sky from light polluted city.

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  7. GhostriderMarch 25, 2012 at 12:21 PM

    Eugen

    "Just a hobby, it is endlessly interesting and awe inspiring."

    Good for you. It's very frustrating to watch the sky from light polluted city.

    This ^^^

    When I first moved into my current home some 30 years ago I used to be able to see the Milky Way from my backyard. Spent many nights up into the wee hours visually gazing with my old 10" Dobsonian. Sadly, urban creep and the subsequent light pollution has all but killed my amateur astronomy hobby. :(

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  8. EugenMarch 25, 2012 at 1:45 PM

    10" Dobsonian - nice.


    Royal Astronomical Society of Canada is promoting Light Pollution Abatement. They are trying to convince regional governments to slowly replace usual "cobra" light fixtures which illuminate the sky unnecessarily.

    I see something positive happening lately. New installations are mostly properly shaded fixtures with sharp cut off above horizontal plane. Looks like local governments are listening.


    Any nebulous objects are impossible from the city but Moon, planets, open clusters, asterisms , binary or other multi star systems, variable stars are still OK. At least where I live.

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  9. velikovskysMarch 25, 2012 at 2:35 PM

    If you are willing to sleep under the stars,two to three hours away is dark sky,if you go 7 hrs or so the Ft Davis / McDonald Observatory is an 11

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