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damnit

we have the grandkids today and i wanted to watch it with them 

3 hours ago, Toastrel said:

Smart move. The Challenger blew up because they made the wrong call on weather.

If you are curious, read "What Do You Care What Other People Think?" by Richard Feynman

Different kind of weather. 

5 hours ago, NCTANK said:

damnit

we have the grandkids today and i wanted to watch it with them 

You’ll still have a chance. Someone mentioned they’re trying again Saturday. 

9 hours ago, Bill said:

Different kind of weather. 

Adverse for launch, is adverse for launch, whether cold, storms or what have you.

Richard Feynman's dissection of the Challenger incident is very enlightening. They way he finally had to show them was genius.

way to bring the rain, toaster!  saturday is much more convenient for me. :thumbsup:   

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LINK

Astronomers Confirm The Earth-Sized Planet at Proxima Centauri Is Definitely There

VICTOR TANGERMANN, FUTURISM

29 MAY 2020

Using state-of-the-art astronomical instruments, an international team of researchers has confirmed the existence of Proxima b, an Earth-like planet that's orbiting the closest star to our Solar System, Proxima Centauri.  "Confirming the existence of Proxima b was an important task, and it's one of the most interesting planets known in the solar neighborhood," Alejandro Suarez Mascareño, lead author of a paper about the research accepted for publication in the journal Astronomy & Astrophysics, said in a statement.  They found that Proxima b is 1.17 times the mass of Earth, smaller than the older estimate of 1.3 times. It orbits its star in just 11.2 days.

Nailing down the mass of a distant planet with such precision is "completely unheard of," said 2019 Nobel Prizer winner Michel Mayor, who laid the groundwork for the technology that made the discovery possible, in the statement.  Proxima b was first discovered in 2016 using HARPS (High Accuracy Radial Velocity Planet Searcher), a planet-hunting spectrograph mounted to one of the telescopes at the European Southern Observatory at the La Silla Observatory in Chile.  The scientists were able to hone in on the planet with ESPRESSO, a new generation spectrograph also at the observatory in Chile, which boasts three times the precision as HARPS.  "We were already very happy with the performance of HARPS, which has been responsible for discovering hundreds of exoplanets over the last 17 years," Francesco Pepe, astronomy professor at the University of Geneva, Switzerland, and leader of ESPRESSO.  

"We're really pleased that ESPRESSO can produce even better measurements, and it's gratifying and just reward for the teamwork lasting nearly 10 years," Pepe, who also co-authored the paper, added.  Even though Proxima b orbits its star at such a close distance, it still receives about the same amount of energy from it that Earth does from the Sun. And that has astronomers excited about the potential of finding alien life.  But there's some bad news: Proxima Centauri tends to bombard any planets in its vicinity with a ferocious amount of X-rays - Proxima b receives about 400 times the amount as Earth receives from its Sun.

That leads to the question: "Is there an atmosphere that protects the planet from these deadly rays?" asked co-author Christophe Lovis, a researcher who worked on ESPRESSO, in the statement.  Lovis hopes that the next generation of spectrographs - ESPRESSO's successor, "RISTRETTO," is already in the works - could help us find the answer.  For us to get a closer look at Proxima b however, Proxima Centauri is "only" 4.2 light-years from the Sun - meaning it would still take several thousand years to get there using today's propulsion technology.

 

17 minutes ago, mayanh8 said:

 

How much are internal combustion engine failures a contributor to small/single prop plane crashes? I imagine pilot error is #1, but I have to think engine failure is up there.

Electric should, theoretically, be much more reliable with less maintenance.

39 minutes ago, mayanh8 said:

 

Powered from the solar cells, so no batteries to speak of, no night flying. This is very cool, though.

We have to get efficient storage, hydrogen fuel cells or something. Current battery technology is dirty and wasteful.

Bummer.

4 minutes ago, Kz! said:

Bummer.

That's a prototype

15 minutes ago, Mike030270 said:

That's a prototype

Looks like they've got the explosion part of controlled explosion down pat.

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16 minutes ago, Mike030270 said:

That was a prototype

FYP

2 minutes ago, Mlodj said:

FYP

Touche'

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5 minutes ago, Mlodj said:

 

Great. Now the 'top 10 deadliest everything' will be able to leave Australia 

9 minutes ago, Mlodj said:

 

Better start building that wall. 

Let’s try this again today!

*80% chance of rain by launch time....doesn’t look so good already.🙁

56 minutes ago, hey suess said:

Let’s try this again today!

*80% chance of rain by launch time....doesn’t look so good already.🙁

Why don't they launch in the morning?

42 minutes ago, Mike030270 said:

Why don't they launch in the morning?

Windows probably are ideal at specific times for linking to the ISS.

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17 minutes ago, hey suess said:

Windows probably are ideal at specific times for linking to the ISS.

Should have used a Mac.

17 minutes ago, hey suess said:

Windows probably are ideal at specific times for linking to the ISS.

Forgot about that part

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