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March 2007 and beyond...
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Future events or events in progress. |
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Events listed below, are mostly of general or scientific interest.
They are often open to the general public. |
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| March 9 |
ASOD Meeting ASOD (Astronomy Society of the Desert, Coachella Valley, California). |
| March 17 |
ASOD Star party ASOD (Astronomy Society of the Desert, Coachella Valley, California). Location: Coachella Valley Preserve. |
| March 16 - 18 |
RAS Star Party (Riverside Astronomy Society, Riverside California). |
| April 7 |
RAS Meeting (Riverside Astronomy Society, Riverside California). |
| April 13 |
ASOD Meeting ASOD (Astronomy Society of the Desert, Coachella Valley, California). |
| April 14 |
ASOD Star party ASOD (Astronomy Society of the Desert, Coachella Valley, California). Location: Sawmill Trailhead. |
| April 13 - 15 |
RAS Star Party (Riverside Astronomy Society, Riverside California). |
| May 5 |
RAS Meeting (Riverside Astronomy Society, Riverside California). |
| May 11 |
ASOD Meeting ASOD (Astronomy Society of the Desert, Coachella Valley, California). |
| May 11 - 13 |
RAS Star Party (Riverside Astronomy Society, Riverside California). |
| May 19 |
ASOD Star party ASOD (Astronomy Society of the Desert, Coachella Valley, California). Location: Sawmill Trailhead. |
| May 25 - 27 |
RTMC (Big Bear, California) (Riverside Telescope Makers Conference). |
Solar system |
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| Object: Earth Moon. Date and Time standard: PST (Pacific Standard Time). Year: 2006-2007 |
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| Month: |
1st quarter: |
full moon: |
latest quarter: |
new moon: |
| January 2007 |
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3 |
11 |
18 |
| January |
25 |
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| February |
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1 |
10 |
17 |
| February |
23 |
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| March |
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3 |
11 |
18 |
| March |
25 |
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| April |
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2 |
10 |
17 |
| April |
23 |
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| May |
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2 |
9 |
16 |
| May |
23 |
31 |
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Sky charts and observations. |
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March is a popular month to accomplish the Messier marathon.
The following charts display the time at which Messier objects become visible in the sky for Coachella Valley location, or Southern California.
 (www.linuxastronomy.org).
 (www.linuxastronomy.org).
 (www.linuxastronomy.org).
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Remote controlled telescope status of realization. |
When our remote controlled telescope project progress, a status is posted in this area. |
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(www.linuxastronomy.org), this image is an animation.
Test of motorization on the declination axis.
The telescope is partially assembled, but not completed yet.
(www.linuxastronomy.org).
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Today in history. Some interesting events. |
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Historical events, such as past, present and future space missions. |
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Date: |
History events (sorted by year, month, day): |
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2007 March 14 |
Pi day (en.wikipedia.org) celebration... ;-)
This is an unofficial "funny" celebration in a few educational schools.
It is also celebrated on July 22, as 22 of July is 22/7 in most European date format, which correspond to a popular approximation of Pi.
It is also celebrated on December 21 (355 days of the year) at 1:13, which correspond to the approximation 355/113 (which is more accurate than 22/7).
355/113 seems to have been first demonstrated around the 5th century by a Chinese mathematician and astronomer Zu Chongzhi (en.wikipedia.org).
Later, it seems a Japanese mathematician Mikami Yoshio (en.wikipedia.org), gave the name "Milü" to the ratio.
The mathematical constant  π (pi) (en.wikipedia.org) is an irrational real number, approximately equal to 3.14159, which is the ratio of a circle's circumference to its diameter in Euclidean geometry.
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2007 March 1 |
Launch of the International Polar Year (www.ipy.org) (l'Année polaire internationale).
The International Polar Year is a worldwide recognized organization, it inspired the International Geophysical Year (en.wikipedia.org).
As a reminder, the space race started while both organizations were meetings. The first satellite Sputnik was launched for this event.
The International Polar Year, was also the organization that were able to bring together, all political interested party, to sign and ratify the Antarctic Treaty, it was in 1961.
International Polar Year (en.wikipedia.org).
l'Année polaire internationale (www.annee-polaire.fr) (français).
Année polaire internationale (fr.wikipedia.org) (français).
l'Institut polaire français Paul Emile Victor (www.institut-polaire.fr) (français).
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1965 March 18 |
Voskhod 2 (en.wikipedia.org) was another breakthrough from the Soviet space mission that featured the first "space walk" of one of its two cosmonauts.
Voskhod 2 (en.wikipedia.org).
Image of first ever the spacewalk.
Several mission details, was leaked probably on purpose, by Soviet officials. Possible reasons include but not limited to :
- To let the rest of the world find out the mission is a real one, not a spacewalk in a movie studio.
- The success of the (1965) spacewalk would be a huge p.r. win for the Soviets, that prepared what would be the very unpopular construction of the Berlin wall (1961). In 1965, the Eastern German government started the construction of a concrete wall. Up to that time it was a barbed wire separation.
The radio frequencies used to communicate with the crew have been disclosed to the public by the "TASS" agency.
The spacecraft was launched from Baikonur with an orbit of 169 km and 473 km at 64.8 degree. Each revolution around the Earth took 90.9 minutes.
The spacewalk itself was publicly announced only once cosmonaut Aleksei Leonov was back in the spacecraft.
Aleksei Leonov went outside the vessel for about 20 minutes. It has been said the space walk, as well as the rest of the mission, went without any problem, however it was at the "cold war" era of history. Later information came to describe the mission with more detail, it did not seem to have gone as seemless as said earlier.
The 2 cosmonauts were working in a very high risk environment, without any possibility of any escape vehicle and very limited extra oxygen.
Outside the spacecraft, Aleksei Leonov space suit became so stiff he barely could move, he had some dificulty to accomplish any task, such as using the 16mm camera. When it was time to come back inside the "airlock" or transfert module, his space suit inflated more than what had been planned, it could not make it back into the airlock "room", without releasing some air pressure from the space suit, in a desperate but courageous move, which he did.
Once air leaked out of the spacesuit, he was able to come back inside the airlock "room" relatively easily.
The astronauts repressurised the spacecraft quickly to prevent some nitrogen bubling inside Aleksei Leonov blood vessels.
When it was time for reentry into Earth atmosphere, the automatic device used for reentry, had trouble to receive signal from the ground station. After several try, the cosmonaut receive a message from the ground station letting them do a manual reentry instead.
When the signal for retrofire ignition has been received, the spacecraft was past the planned point, which resulted a landing far away from the intended one.
The spacecraft landed about 2000 km (about 1240 miles), further away than the planned.
It landed at about 59 degree North latitude instead of probably 52 degree North latitude, as Soviet spacecraft usually land.
The service module did not detach fully before reentry, it seems it is only when in the reentry process thatn the last bolts burned and allowed the spacecraft to land safely.
The spacecraft landed in a forest in the Ural mountains instead of a tree less plain in Kazahkstan.
The spacecraft has been located rather quickly, however the crew took longer to respond, but it finally happened. The crew landed in an area with deep snow, it seems may be some wolf were the first visitors to the two cosmonauts.
Recovery helicopters did not seems able to land easily, between trees and in heavy snow. Finally an helicopter landed about 5 km (about 3.1 miles) away. An helicopter dropped some supplies to the crew as they would have to spend the night in the cold until a sky patrol could reach them.
Around 4:30 am a resue patrol was dropped about 1.5 km (about 0.93 mile) from the spacecraft, but it still took about 4 hours to reach the two cosmonauts.
Finally a team of about 20 people reached the two cosmonauts, they spent another night in the cold. They cleared an area big enough so an helicopter could land safely, it was still a few km from the spacecraft, that can let an idea how harsh nature was in the area...
The resue team asa well as the two cosmonauts skied to the landing site, to take a first helicopter that would bring them to a bigger one. They reached Baikonur more than 48 hours after they landed.
The Voskhod 2 mission revisited (www.svengrahn.pp.se).
The next generation: Gemini and Voskhod (www.space.edu).
Voskhod 2 (en.wikipedia.org).
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1958 March 17 |
Vanguard 1 (en.wikipedia.org) or Vanguard I is the oldest artificial satellite still orbiting Earth, though there is no longer any communication with it.
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1954 March 1 |
Castle Bravo (en.wikipedia.org) hydrogen bomb.
Unexpected fallout from the detonation—intended to be a secret test—poisoned the crew of Daigo Fukuryū Maru ("Lucky Dragon No. 5"), a Japanese fishing boat, and created international concern about atmospheric thermonuclear testing.
It was the most powerful nuclear device ever detonated by the United States, with a yield of 15 megatons. That yield, far exceeding the expected yield of 4 to 8 megatons, combined with other factors to produce the worst radiological accident ever caused by the United States.
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1950 March 17 |
Official day used to present a new chemical element, called Californium (en.wikipedia.org).
The Californium chemical element does not exist naturally, it was first produced at the University of California, Berkeley, using a Cyclotron (en.wikipedia.org).
Californium atomic number is 98 (education.jlab.org) and it has an atomic weight of 251, on the Periodic table (en.wikipedia.org) of chemical elements.
Californium is part of the Actinide (en.wikipedia.org) or "actinoid" group of elements.
All actinides elements are radioactive. Actinoids are considered to have a short half-live (en.wikipedia.org).
Half-life, is the time required for a quantity to decay to half of its initial value.
Printable version of the Periodic table (education.jlab.org) of chemical elements. This periodic table of chemical element is courtesy of "Jefferson Lab" (http://www.jlab.org)
(Thomas Jefferson National Accelerator Facility, Newport News, VA 23606).
The Periodic Table of Elements (education.jlab.org). More information with an "html" (HyperText Markup Language) based table.
Cyclotron (education.jlab.org).
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Please, Let me know if you feel it does not display properly on your browser, or if you find out some inaccuracy.
I am not a native speaker of the English language, Do not hesitate to let me know of any grammar or spelling mistakes.
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Legal
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The information on this site is believed to be correct, if you find any error, please send a message to the webmaster. We will do our best to fix any error in a timely manner.
Meanwhile, there is absolutely no waranty of any kind, the information on this site is accurate, neither correct.
To send us a message.
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Feel free to link to this page and give proper credit to it.
However it is not allowed to put this page or site into a frame, without first asking for it.
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This page as well as the whole site is Copyright© , 2001 - 2006 Eugene Clement
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Space |
Astronomy picture of the day (M104, sombrero galaxy). NASA
Hubble space telescope, picture of the day (images and videos), (cat eye nebula).
ESA European Space Agency.
Picture from the OSEI (Operational Significant Event Imagery). These images usually represent environment change events.
Earth motion for Coachella Valley.
 seismology for Coachella Valley (Southern California).
Light pollution prevention start at home.
The night sky in the World. Satellite monitoring of the artificial night sky brightness and the stellar visibility.
IDAInternational Dark-Sky Association.
 Auroral Activity (Northern Hemisphere). NOAA Polar-orbiting Operational Environmental Satellite (POES) continually monitor the power flux carried by the protons and electrons that produce aurora in the atmosphere.
 Auroral Activity Southern Hemisphere.
 GOES Solar X-ray Imager, provide full-disk images of the Sun once a minute in the 0.6-6 nm range with 5 arcsec pixels.
It allow real-time prediction of solar-terrestrial disturbances.
more info.
 SOHO Pick of the Week. Courtesy of SOHO/EIT and SOHO/LASCO consortium. SOHO is a project of international cooperation between ESA and NASA.
 latest SOHO images171.
 latest SOHO images284.
CosmicopiaMore about Cosmic Rays (educational).
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Our Sponsor |
People at Alembic have helped us in many ways, at first as sponsors, then as volunteers as well.
They are so dedicated, I would not be surprised if their guitars run linux. ;-)
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About the Author |
I am simply a Linux enthusiast with an interest in science.
I like to build hardware projects and connect them to computers, to do data acquisitions and other things. I also like to make telescopes or make existing telescopes more convenient to use.
This page will hopefully help me to learn something. I am happy if I can share it with the reader.
I belong to the following astronomy societies: RAS. ASOD
and linuxastronomy.org, which is a virtual group of linux enthusiast, experimenting with astronomy.
Suggestions or corrections with for goal to make this site better are welcome.
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Phase d'occultation de la lune
image of an equinox
