And so goes the space shuttle as it re-enters the earth's atmosphere for landing.

The space shuttle Endeavour had to be diverted to California today for it's landing since Florida was stormy. And, by golly, it indeed went right over L.A.

When it does that we get a whopper of a double sonic boom. Shakes the whole house... twice... and LOUDLY!

I was playing a computer game when the booms happened. Made a nice alarm clock for me, telling me to turn on the TV to watch the landing.

They said on the radio earlier in the day: 1:19 is when the descent should begin. And 1:19 was exactly when the booms happened. The gov can do some things right.

I watched it on my 22" widescreen monitor here I've heard the double booms a couple times when I lived in Ms. Cool stuff

Being a native of SoCal, where they did all of that test flying for breaking the sound barrier, I grew up hearing sonic booms. When all of that stopped, I kind of missed hearing them.

The first time that the shuttle landed where it went directly over Los Angeles, I was a bit surprised by the HUGE booms. When the shuttle is a little bit over the ocean or the desert, it's not quite so intense. But when it's over the city... whoa!

That big craft displaces a whole lot more air than did those little jet flyers Chuck Yeager and others flew. But after that first time, I knew what to expect.

ONe of the landings was a night landing. We got to watch the shuttle fly by in an orange ball at 9000 miles an hour I used my binoculars, you could see the outline of the shuttle in glowing orange, it was cool!

Every time I check the ISS flying by the shuttle is there, either docked or readying to come home. Using binoculars you can see the shuttle flying upsidedown with the bay doors open. That's cool too

The moon, venus and jupiter tonite....


http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2008/24nov_skyshow.htm?list46786

I saw that, neck...pretty spectacular. My Australian webmaster sent a pic to me...in the Southern Hemisphere the moon and planets made a happy face, in this hemisphere it was frowning...heh heh.

I had to use binoculars to get that pic. That's what the glow ring is, the flash seeping in through the view ring

It's a cool pic.

I'm at 6000 feet, 2.5 hours away from a major city, so it was very bright here. We can still see the Milky Way here some nights.

Yeah, I was looking up at the sky and was amazed at the 'high clouds' and then realized it was dust/gas in an arm of the milkyway

Pretty trippy when you can see it, huh!

I could see it on the coast through the city lights.. but that's a military town so we had the up-to-datest lights

I wish I could see things like that.

With all the buildings and lights I'm lucky to see the most prominant stars. I can't see any horizon from where I'm located.


Great pic!

http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2008/09dec_fullmoon.htm?list46786

Biggest Full Moon of the Year

Dec. 9, 2008: No, you can not see Neil Armstrong's footprint. But go ahead and look: The full Moon of Dec. 12th is the biggest and brightest full Moon of the year.

It's no illusion. Some full Moons are genuinely larger than others and this Friday's is a whopper. Why? The Moon's orbit is an ellipse with one side 50,000 km closer to Earth than the other: diagram. In the language of astronomy, the two extremes are called "apogee" (far away) and "perigee" (nearby). On Dec. 12th, the Moon becomes full a scant 4 hours after reaching perigee, making it 14% bigger and 30% brighter than lesser full Moons we've seen earlier in 2008.

Cool!

Apogee always reminds me of those old-school computer games my brother and I used to download and play. Apogee games had all of my favorites.

I need to get my butt outside and look at the sky. Looks like it might be a clear night.

Biggest Full Moon of the Year: Take 2
01.08.2009

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January 8, 2009: When last month's full Moon rose over Florida, onlooker Raquel Stanton of Cocoa Beach realized that something was up.

"The Moon was stunningly gorgeous--and it looked bigger than usual!" she says. "My whole family noticed and watched in awe."

Like millions of others around the world, she had witnessed the biggest full Moon of 2008--a "perigee Moon," 14% wider and 30% brighter than lesser Moons she had seen before. "I'll never forget it."

Alert: It's about to happen again.

This Saturday night, Jan. 10th, another perigee Moon is coming. It's the biggest full Moon of 2009, almost identical to the one that impressed onlookers in Dec. 2008.