New Meteor Shower Could Be Big

Friday/Saturday May 23rd/24th 

       The astronomy community has been abuzz with the potential major meteor shower Saturday morning that might turn into a fantastic cosmic storm.

       Any time after sunset Friday May 23 and sunrise Saturday May 24, fragments of an ancient comet will be bombarding Earth for the first time, and the predictions range from 10 to 10,000 meteors an hour!

       Once again the unpredictability of celestial events has created an excitement that will play out as the laws of physics takes Earth through a stream of tiny rocks crossing our orbit. 

       Like looking out a car window at night in a snowstorm, the comet debris seems to radiate out of a point in space—like snowflakes in headlights of the moving car.

       The dust of comet P209/LINEAR has finally crossed into the path of Earth, barreling along its 800 million mile solar orbit at 30,000 mph.  This comet was discovered in 2004, but has been around since the 1800s in a five-year orbit that loops around the Earth and back to the Sun.

Lyrid Meteor Shower April 22, 2012  (NASA All Sky Camera)

       The May Camelopardalids have not occurred before, and they will emanate out of the constellation called the Giraffe.  This will be good as Camelopardalis is an indistinct star pattern in the north between the Big and Little Dippers—so it will be visible all night long. It is just an illusion that the meteors radiate out of the giraffe, that’s just the direction in space we are plowing through.

       The predictions come from the top meteor researchers in the world and range from 20 an hour (very respectable) to 200 a minute (a meteor storm!).

Lincoln Near Earth Asteroid Research Center (LINEAR), NASA and the US Air Force are partners in surveying the skies for comets and asteroids that could be hazardous to our planet.  Comet 209/LINEAR is just one of hundreds of objects under surveillance.

        In fact, there are 1,470 Near Earth Objects (NEA) being watched that might someday hit the Earth, and that number changes monthly.  Gravity interactions with our Moon and other planets might alter the predicted orbit, sending a harmless asteroid or comet into a collision course with Earth.

       Asteroids don’t trail debris as they are rocky bodies from a few thousand feet to a few miles in size.  Comets are bodies of rock and ice that have their surfaces stripped when warmed up as their orbit is nearest the Sun, called perihelion. The solar wind blows two tails away from the Sun, one of gases from the ice and the other of solid debris. A comet refreezes as it heads to the farthest point from the Sun, called aphelion.

       Comet P209/LINEAR isn’t passing by Earth, it’s on the other side of the Sun.  But Earth is intersecting the debris field of the comet’s orbit, which is above and below the plane of our solar orbit.  

A couple times a month the Earth encounters debris from other comets, but most of the time there isn’t much left. But there are still some thick streams of cosmic dust left, and they create the famous and reliable meteor showers of the Lyrids, Geminids and Perseids.

Most meteors are tiny, the size of sand grains. They disintegrate from the friction of the Earth’s atmosphere when slamming into us at thousands of miles an hour.  The energy is released as light, and sometimes there is a smoky trail called a train. When a big meteor, maybe the size of a small rock, strikes the atmosphere it can explode in several blasts, light the sky and even have sound.  These are called bolides, and are being captured nearly weekly on security cameras around the world.

Debris in space is called a meteoroid, when in the Earth’s atmosphere like a “shooting star” it’s a meteor and when found on the ground it’s a meteorite.  Incredibly, some 10 tons lands on Earth everyday—that’s 20,000 pounds of cosmic debris!

And, of course, larger pieces of meteoroids—some weighing tons—have made it through the atmosphere intact, often creating craters when hitting the ground.

The potential Camelopardalis Meteor Shower will be fun to watch as the shooting stars draw attention to the circumpolar constellations of the two bears, Cassiopeia the Queen, Draco the Dragon and Cepheus the King.  

The ancient Greeks believed in an animal that was had the head of a camel and spots of a leopard—a camel-leopard.  A “new” constellation drawn up by faint stars between Ursa Major and Cassiopeia, it first appeared in star charts in a 1624 book by the German mathematician Jakob Bartsch, a son-in-law of the great astronomer-mathematician Johannes Kepler.  

You don’t need any special equipment to observer a meteor shower, just patience and some creature comforts to get you though the long hours of surveying the night sky. 

Some of the essential equipment is lawn chairs, a light blanket, refreshments, snacks and maybe a radio.  Star charts, a red flashlight to read them and a pair of binoculars will help you learn the stars and constellations and some of the celestial treasures they contain. Meteor watching can be a great time to test the waters of the hobby, and see if the astronomy bug bites.

Photography of meteors is not easy, but you might catch a few if you have a camera that can have its shutter open for 10 minutes or longer.  Set the camera on a tripod, chose an ISO sensitivity of 800 or more, and set the time exposure.  The stars will trail as they move in the sky, and the meteors will be bright streaks of light.  Capturing a meteor with a camera is tough, but worth a try while your eyes record the fleeting streaks of light.

Stay up all night this Friday, May 23, or set your alarm clock for 2-3 am on Saturday May 24 to catch a falling star.  If the skies are clear, you won’t be disappointed.  

       

RUSSIAN COUP AT THE SPACE STATION?      

          What a predicament!

          Russia can easily take control of the earth-orbiting International Space Station, shared by 15 other countries and built piece-by-piece with 37 American Space Shuttle missions.

         And in the midst of the Ukraine crisis, the head of their space program has posted on Twitter that threat of a coup in outer space.

          Russian Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Rogozin, whose bank assets have been frozen as a target of U.S. sanctions, twitted this on April 27^th:

“After analyzing the sanctions against our space industry, I suggest to the USA to bring their astronauts to the International Space Station using a trampoline.”

In other words, Rogozin, the head of the Russian Space Agency, has told America to take a flying leap if it wants access to the ISS!

INTERNATIONAL SPACE STATION     NASA Photo

          Along with the US sanctions against Russia, NASA has banned any contact with the Russian Space Agency’s headquarters at Star City, outside Moscow.  Exceptions are the training underway for American astronauts and their assigned missions with cosmonauts and other foreign space fliers.

The International Space Station orbiting Earth could become literally occupied by Russians only, as they have the only spaceship that can dock there.  Their three-man Soyuz spacecraft became the only ride when Congress and the Obama Administration decided to retire in 2010 the Space Shuttle program and its three veteran Orbiters.

          The tense international situation has repercussions all over the world, but 225 miles high in outer space, the drama seems written out of a blockbuster spy novel. The International Space Station is easy to see with the naked eye as a bright star moving across the night sky, a popular object for even casual stargazers.

          Aboard the ISS is the first commander from the Japan, Koichi Wakata.  The other five members of the Expedition 39 crew are Americans are Steve Swanson and Rick Mastracchio, and three Russians: Oleg Artemyev, Alexander Skvortsov and Mikhail Tyurin.

          The crews rotate out in groups of three, as two Soyuz space craft are always attached to the amazing research facility that space insiders simply call “The Station.”

          After 150 days in space, Commander Wakata, Russian Tyurin and American Mastracchio will return to Earth in their Soyuz TMA-11M spacecraft on May 13.  That will leave two Russian and an American on the ISS until the launch of the Expedition 40 crew in Soyuz TMA-13M on May 28^th consisting of a Russian, an American and a European.

          When the Ukraine crisis spurred world sanctions, NASA said the science aboard The Station would continue with Americans as planned.  But as military actions escalated, so has the rhetoric about what could happen aboard the ISS. 

          NASA has been paying up to $70 million to a seat in the cramped Soyuz capsule, a spaceship design first flown in 1968 and modernized as technology progressed. 

Russian Soyuz spaceship docked at ISS  NASA photo

          America’s four to six person Orion space capsule is still three or four years away from test flights, let alone routine missions to the ISS. The only other spaceship in the world is China’s Shenzhou, a knock-off of the bulbous, three section Soyuz.

          China is not a partner in the $100 billion ISS, and has flown only five very ambitious human missions, including two to their own, small space station. But could China become a space partner of the ISS and supply rides?  Back in the 1970s, it seemed impossible that the USA and Russia would cooperate in outer space.

The Station has recently been granted a life extension until at least 2024. The orbiting outpost is the largest manmade structure in space, and rotating crews of astronauts and cosmonauts have manned it since 2000. Five space agencies representing 15 different countries helped build the space laboratory.

Could Russia take the ISS as hostage?

If Russian President Vladimir Putin wants to, it’s a real possibility.

Not only do the Russian’s have the only manned spaceships going to The Station, but they have the only weapons on-board, too!

That’s right, under the commander’s seat of both Soyuz spaceships now docked to the ISS is a combination rifle/shotgun/machete weapon that has flown on every manned mission. Called the TP-82, it is the bail-out gun for Russian military pilots. Because the Soyuz spacecraft lands on solid ground, an errant trajectory could necessitate a survival scenario for a day or two—which has occurred several times.

So, Russians could execute an actual armed take-over of The Station.  What repercussions would that create?

NASA Chief Charlie Bolden has noted that the space station has been through “multiple international crises” since crews began living there full-time on Nov. 2, 2000. That includes the 2008 war between Russia and Georgia over break-away regions Abkhazia and South Ossetia.

If Russia kicked everyone off the ISS and maintained it themselves, not just America would be affected.  Five space agencies are involved, the others being Canada, Europe and Japan, all contributing billions of dollars to the development and construction of The Station.

The crisis might accelerate the work being done by three private aerospace firms building manned spacecraft.  Already the firm Space-X has flown successful unmanned supply mission with their spaceship called Dragon, which is being modified for human travel.  Behind it are two other spaceflight firms, Orbital Science Corp. and Virgin Galactic.

          Currently there have been 212 individuals who have docked with The Station, including 31 women (none of which have been Russian). That represents a total of 355 “tickets” punched, with the multiple visits by single astronauts. Six people have made four flights, including current crewman Mastracchio. There are 26 persons who have made three flights and 76 people have lived on the ISS twice.

          As tensions continue between Russia and the Free World over their actions in the Ukraine, the politics will spill upward to outer space and the crown jewel of 50 years of space exploration—the International Space Station.

          Some facts about the ISS:

·       The covering the size of a football field, the entire complex weighs 816,000 pounds.

·       The acre of solar panels generates 110 kilowatts of power, and the panels move to face the Sun as The Station orbits.

·       Traveling at 17,500 mph (5 miles per second) at an average 220 miles high, the ISS takes 90 minutes to orbit the 25,000 mile circumference of Earth.

·       Keep in mind that the ISS orbit is in 45 minutes of daylight, then 45 minutes of night, creating 17 sunrises and sunsets each 24-hour period.

·       Eight tons of food is required to support a six person expedition crew for half a year. Because the sense of taste is somewhat suppressed in space, crews enjoy spicy foods, including shrimp cocktail, tortillas, barbecue beef brisket, breakfast sausage links, chicken fajitas, vegetable quiche, macaroni and cheese, candy-coated chocolates and cherry blueberry cobbler. Lemonade is the most popular drink.

·       There are 13 rooms on the ISS, the most popular being the seven-window cupola, where spacefliers have a breathtaking view of Earth and space.