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Antares" on the Frau Mauro H
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| Title |
Antares" on the Frau Mauro Highlands |
| Full Description |
A front view of the Apollo 14 Lunar Module "Antares", which reflects a circular flare caused by the brilliant sun. The unusual ball of light was said by the astronauts to have a jewel-like appearance. At extreme left, the lower slope of Cone Crater can be seen. |
| Date |
02/05/1971 |
| NASA Center |
Johnson Space Center |
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Shepard Plants Flag
| Title |
Shepard Plants Flag |
| Full Description |
Astronaut Alan B. Shepard Jr., Apollo 14 Commander, stands by the U.S. flag on the lunar Fra Mauro Highlands during the early moments of the first extravehicular activity (EVA-1) of the mission. Shadows of the Lunar Module "Antares", astronaut Edgar D. Mitchell, Lunar Module pilot, and the erectable S-band Antenna surround the scene of the third American flag planting to be performed on the lunar surface. |
| Date |
02/05/1971 |
| NASA Center |
Johnson Space Center |
|
Tracks to "Antares
| Title |
Tracks to "Antares |
| Full Description |
The Apollo 14 Lunar Module (LM) "Antares" is photographed against a brilliant sun glare during the first extravehicular activity (EVA-1). A bright trail left in the lunar soil by the two-wheeled Modularized Equipment Transporter (MET) leads from the LM. |
| Date |
02/05/1971 |
| NASA Center |
Johnson Space Center |
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Venus On The Horizon
| Title |
Venus On The Horizon |
| Explanation |
The month of October [ http://www.skypub.com/whatsup/oct97sky.html ] features a sky full of planets, including Venus as the brilliant evening star. Besides the sun and moon, Venus is the brightest object [ http://www.seds.org/billa/nineplanets/venus.html ] visible in Earth's sky. This month, Venus appears in early evening near the red planet Mars [ http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap970528.html ] and Mars' red giant rival Antares [ http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap970922.html ] above the southwestern horizon. Because it is closer to the sun than Earth, Venus never strays far from the sun in its apparent position [ http://quasar.as.utexas.edu/courses/ast309/misc/DresdenCodex.html ] and is seen during the year as either a bright morning or evening star [ http://rowlf.cc.wwu.edu:8080/~skywise/legends.html#Evening Star ]. This beautiful sunset imaged from low earth orbit by the Atlantis space shuttle [ http://www.ksc.nasa.gov/shuttle/resources/orbiters/atlantis.html ] crew in May 1989 also reveals the planet Venus blazing above Earth's horizon. It is a fitting image [ http://images.jsc.nasa.gov/images/pao/STS30/10063311.htm ] for this mission and crew [ http://www.ksc.nasa.gov/shuttle/missions/sts-30/sts-30-press-kit.txt ]. It was recorded following the successful release of the robot Venus-explorer Magellan [ http://nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/planetary/magellan.html ], the first planetary probe to be deployed from a space shuttle. |
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Moon Lightning
| Title |
Moon Lightning |
| Explanation |
Moonsets [ http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap020921.html ] are not often quite as exciting as this one. But amateur astronomer Marc-Andre Besel was impressed by the brilliant lighting displays that joined the first quarter [ http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap010428.html ] Moon and stars of the constellation Scorpius [ http://hawastsoc.org/deepsky/sco/index.html ] in western skies. On August 22, 2004, his view looked [ http://people.freenet.de/besel/ Fotoalben/Blitz/PAGE1.HTM ] across the Gulf of Mexico from Anna Maria Island, Florida, USA, a region that would experience even more stormy [ http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap040903.html ] weather in the coming days. The alluring digital image is a time exposure, by chance [ http://images.jsc.nasa.gov/luceneweb/ fullimage.jsp?photoId=S83-40452 ] capturing the details of a brief flash of lightning [ http://thunder.msfc.nasa.gov/primer/primer2.html ] along with an overexposed Moon and dramatic cloud formations. In fact, the exposure is long enough to show the background stars as short streaks or trails [ http://www.astropix.com/HTML/ I_ASTROP/I06/I0601/I0601.HTM ]. The bright yellowish star trail, just above and right of the lightning flash, is red giant star Antares [ http://www.astro.uiuc.edu/~kaler/sow/antares.html ]. |
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A Close Encounter Of The Ste
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| Title |
A Close Encounter Of The Stellar Kind |
| Explanation |
The unassuming star centered in this sky view [ http://skyview.gsfc.nasa.gov ] will one day be our next door [ http://www.bigear.org/vol1no2/kraus.htm ] stellar neighbor [ http://www.astro.wisc.edu/~dolan/constellations/extra/nearest.html ]. The faint 9th magnitude red dwarf [ http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap991120.html ], currently 63 light-years away [ http://zebu.uoregon.edu/~soper/Stars/parallax_ly.html ] in the constellation Ophiucus [ http://www.astro.wisc.edu/~dolan/constellations/constellations/ Ophiuchus.html ], was recently discovered to be approaching our Solar System. Known in catalogs of nearby stars [ http://tarkus.pha.jhu.edu/~thenry/RECONS.html ] as Gliese 710 it is predicted to come within 1 light-year of the Sun ... a million years from now. At that distance this star, presently much too faint to be seen [ http://liftoff.msfc.nasa.gov/academy/universe/MAG.HTML ] by the naked eye, will blaze at 0.6 magnitude - rivaling the apparent brightness of the mighty red giant Antares [ http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap970624.html ]. Ultimately Gliese 710 poses no direct collision danger itself although its gravitational influence will likely scatter comets out of the Solar System's reservoir, the Oort cloud [ http://www.windows.umich.edu/cgi-bin/tour_def/comets/ Oort_cloud.html ], sending some inbound. This future stellar encounter [ http://cass.jsc.nasa.gov/meetings/dps97/html/H2501/H2501.html ] was discovered by researchers [ http://www.newscientist.com/ns/970524/doomstar.html ] Joan Garcia-Sanchez and Robert Preston (JPL [ http://www.jpl.nasa.gov ]), and collaborators while studying stars in the solar neighborhood [ http://www.clockwk.com/stars/ ] using data from the Hipparcos Astrometry Satellite [ http://astro.estec.esa.nl/SA-general/Projects/Hipparcos/ hipparcos.html ]. The star field shown is based on the Palomar Digitized Sky Survey [ http://www-gsss.stsci.edu/dss/dss.html ] and is 1/4 degree wide (about half the diameter of the full moon). |
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