Smoke trail left by brilliant meteor

Last week, I received an e-mail from Michael J. Fraughton of West Jordan, Utah. At 6:45 a.m. (November 18), his wife showed him a cloud formation of loosely formed rings. He took several photographs of the clouds, two of which accompany this blog. He used a Canon EOS Rebel XTi digital SLR with a Canon EF-S 18-55mm f/3.5-5.6 lens on the automatic setting.

Well, it turns out that the “clouds” actually were a persistent smoke trail left by a brilliant fireball that lit up Salt Lake City and its surroundings at 12:07 a.m. Wednesday. Observers in Tucson, Las Vegas, Santa Fe, and Los Angeles also observed light from the meteor. At the University of Utah, seismometers picked up a slight vibration during the event.

Meteoriticists define a fireball as any meteor brilliant enough to cast a shadow. This object also seems to have exploded (based on the many reports of a single flash) in Earth’s upper atmosphere. Scientists call an exploding meteor a bolide.

Fraughton was only vaguely familiar with the camera, which is his wife’s. So he set it on “automatic” and placed his hand over the flash in order to keep the landscape dark. “I wanted it to think that it had the flash, so the sky would not get overexposed because of a low shutter speed,” he said. Good thinking.

Look closely at the images, and you’ll spot a white dot within the clouds. That’s Venus. Nice work, Michael. Thanks for sending in these great pictures.

Try these weekend observing targets

Did you ever find yourself out under a clear, dark sky in November wondering what to look at? How about targeting a few objects in the constellation Pegasus, one of my favorite autumn constellations. Here are some suggestions:

Galaxy NGC 7479 is one of the most popular objects for viewing in the constellation, as it shows a distinct, nearly face-on barred spiral structure. Photos of NGC 7479 appear frequently in astronomy magazines and on the web and give this object a familiar form. This galaxy lies at the end of a long string of stars that appear starkly to viewers with a 3-inch scope. In a 6-inch scope, this galaxy appears as a bar with a faint haze surrounding it. Larger scopes show much more detail, however, including the asymmetrical arms arcing away from the central glow.

How about targeting the two most conspicuous members of the Pegasus I galaxy cluster (pictured at right)? NGC 7619 and NGC 7626 are worth viewing even in small scopes. The galaxies lie just 7 arcminutes apart; the former shows a bright starlike nucleus while NGC 7626 has a tiny center.

If novelty’s your game, you could also target the first two objects in the NGC — NGC 1 and NGC 2. These galaxies are just 1.8' apart and are easily visible in a 6-inch scope under a dark sky.

Have you ever seen these galaxies? Do you spend time tracking down deep-sky objects in Pegasus? Let us know what your favorite November sky objects are and what you’re viewing them with.

Additional online observing resources from Astronomy magazine:

• StarDome — Our interactive star chart helps you create an accurate map of your sky. This tool will help you locate these targets.
• Video: Observe easy to find objects in the autumn sky, with Senior Editor Rich Talcott
• Video: Autumn observing targets for small telescopes, with Senior Editor Michael E. Bakich [available to magazine subscribers]
• Video: Autumn observing targets for large telescopes, with Editor David J. Eicher [available to magazine subscribers]
• Podcast: Weekly observing targets, with Senior Editor Michael E. Bakich [available for free to registered members of Astronomy.com]
  

NASA technology in your world

NASA recently released its 2009 edition of Spinoff, an annual publication that chronicles successfully commercialized NASA technology. It’s easy to get lost in the magazine or its Web counterpart.

The 2009 issue features 49 “spinoffs” in the areas of health and medicine; public safety; consumer, home, and recreation; environmental and agricultural resources; and more. I enjoyed many of them, but my favorites are the life rafts that use water to prevent the them from capsizing, the star-mapping tools used to track whale sharks, and the “anti-gravity” treadmill that now helps patients relearn to walk or run.

Also, in honor of the 40th anniversary of Apollo 11’s lunar landing, the creators of the publication have also recapped how Apollo continues to provide tangible benefits to the lives of people in the United States and around the world.

Do you appreciate how NASA has given the technology it develops back to the public? Or do you think these commercialized products aren’t anything to write home about? Which 2009 spinoffs are your favorites?

Leaving Earth behind

I inadvertently let an anniversary slip by a few weeks ago. It wasn’t a major one (I’m not sleeping on the couch), but it was nifty enough that I wish I could have celebrated appropriately.

I refer, of course, to the ninth anniversary of the last day every human being was on Earth. On October 31, 2000, the first resident crew of the International Space Station (ISS) launched, and ever since at least two people have been in space at all times. It doesn’t quite break the continuously-off-the-Earth record (currently standing at 10 years, from 1989-1999, thanks to Russia’s Mir space station), but 9 years is still pretty impressive.

Just think: just more than 9 years ago might be the last time ever that all of humanity was located on a single planet. Sure, it’s not like the astronauts and cosmonauts traveled very far, and the ISS crew certainly can’t survive independently of Earth, but it’s still a first step for proving our species might not be tied to this planet forever.

To me, celebrating the last day of earthbound humanity is a little like celebrating Yuri’s Night on April 12, which commemorates Yuri Gagarin’s 1961 seminal flight into space. They both seem a little underwhelming as bases for celebration, until you think about how momentous they really were. In Yuri’s case, living beings possessed the ability to venture out of Earth’s grasp and return safely for the first time in billions of years. That’s just crazy! (Don’t even get me started on how unbelievable it is that there are people walking around who’ve actually set foot on the Moon.) Similarly, the last time all Homo sapiens were ever centrally located is a pretty shocking achievement for a species as fragile as us.

So next year (barring any unforeseen developments), I’ll definitely party for the decentralization of humanity’s big 1-0, and maybe you can join me. Maybe by then I’ll have figured out what an appropriate way to celebrate might be. Or a catchier name for the event.

Have any suggestions for the big party? Or do you think this is much ado about nothing, and mankind’s a long way off from real space travel?

Busting astronomy myths

As the editorial staff of the world’s best-selling astronomy publication, we get a lot of e-mails. Some suggest story ideas, some praise a column, feature, or image, and many ask questions.

Lately, lots of e-mail writers have enquired about astronomy-related stories they’ve heard on the radio or television or read on the Internet. For example, “Is it true that Mars will appear as large as the Full Moon to the naked eye in August?” or, “I’ve heard astronauts can see the Great Wall of China from the Moon.”

Both of these are myths. And, although we answer all e-mails sent to us, at times it may take a while for us to get back to you. So, to provide even speedier replies, we’ve set up a special area called "Astronomy Myths" in the "Welcome to Astronomy" section of our web site, Astronomy.com, to which we can direct questioners.

Once there, you’ll find detailed explanations of myths like “There’s no gravity in space” and “The Moon doesn’t spin.” And, oh yes, we do address the one about the world ending in 2012.