Well, not as far as NASA‘s Voyager spacecrafts (1 & 2) are concerned, they just seem to go on and on!
Now into their 46th year of travel on a continuing journey to explore and send back data from the far reaches of space, NASA is uploading a software patch to overcoming issues with communications issues last year as well as addressing some potential thruster issues that might arise going forward.
It seems that these spacecraft are set for quite a few more years service yet!
Eighteen months (18 months, 13 days, 17 hours, 34 minutes and 43 seconds to be precise) since I last added to this blog! Where has that time gone? Part Pandemic, part other stuff, cycling, my allotments. But even so, where did all that time go!!
I must apply myself and stick to adding to this blog about anything that takes my eye. What to say about the last Eighteen Months? There would be too much to put in one post, so I will have to look back in my ‘to be blogged about‘ bin and pick out the items that I wish I had posted about.
In the meantime, here are some things that caught my eye in the first two days of 2023…
C/2022 E3 (ZTF)
An icy visitor (not a great name, I know) from way beyond. It seems that we have a comet bearing down on us! But it won’t get any closer than a million or so miles away.
You can find out more about the comet by looking at the full details at the Mashable website.
Industrial unrest still seems very much in the headlines, with more action being taken by a number of unions over the coming weeks. It’s like I’m looking in a mirror back to the 1970’s – yes, I’m that old!
The Guardian is publishing a ‘Strike’ calendar so that ‘you’ can plan any activities around the dates. Glad it does not include power outages, unlike the 1970’s!
Back to Space. In a fairly rare event, there is an opportunity to see many of the planets of our Solar System together in the night sky at the same time.
This sight was at its best in the last week of December 2022 if you had clear sky and a good view to the south. You can still catch them over the next day or so, but be quick. Full info on the Earth Sky website.
Came across this interesting article (Location services in Outer Space) yesterday about some of the ‘difficulties’ in navigating your way around Outer Space. When you think about it, on Earth we have now got so used to Google Maps (other mapping software apps are available), it seems to be second nature to use this and other options, like car Sat Nav’s, signposts and even paper maps!!
Copyright – Vecteezy
But what about space? Well it seems it’s not as straight forward as you would think. During a quick browse on the internet, there seems so much information about the subject, it’s filled up quite a few bookmarks to come back to for further reading.
Deep Space Navigation is an interesting read from the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JBL) and has a lot of resources in addition to explanations.
Beasley's Place 