Fizzer

It looked like being tin-foil hat weather on Thursday...

Earth braces for biggest space storm in 5 years

Huge explosions on the sun’s surface are sparking the biggest radiation and geomagnetic storm that Earth has experienced in five years, according to space weather experts.

The storm, expected to hit Earth later today and last for around 24 hours, may disrupt power grids, GPS systems and satellites, and has already forced some airlines to change their routes around the polar regions.

Artist’s impression of sunrise on 9 March 2012. (NASA)

But by next day...

Space weather storm fizzles on arrival

A space weather storm that was forecast to be the strongest in five years has fizzled out and ended up causing no impact to power grids or modern navigation systems, expert say.

A series of eruptions on the sun this week sent radiation and solar plasma hurtling toward Earth at high speeds but, in the end, the geomagnetic storm registered the lowest level, G1, on a five-step scale.

It must be a thankless gig being a space weather expert.

—READ MORE—

Kind of makes you feel small

There’s oodles of perspectivity in an essay in The Monthly by Luke Davies about the ‘final frontier’ of space travel.

For instance, the following quote from Richard Obousy of Project Icarus:

“We only have the capability to produce a few tenths of a billion of a gram of antimatter – in fact, that’s about the level that CERN is creating at the moment. And if you extrapolate the cost you get into trillions of dollars per gram of antimatter. But CERN isn’t optimised for antimatter creation. It’s a nice by-product of the experiments they do, but it’s like building an entire McDonald’s chain just to get a single French fry.”

“Anti-matter rocket”

To put that further into perspective, our present trouble is that an even modestly ambitious interstellar space travel program would require a mass production line of McHappy Meals.

UPDATE

By the way, the double entendre of “kind of makes you feel small” in juxtaposition with the ‘phallic’ imagery has only just now occurred to me. It was either completely unintentional, or unconscious expression of a deep-seated anxiety. But, as Freud once said, sometimes a cigar is just a cigar.

—READ MORE—

Interstellar war imminent

It’s astonishing, but there’s not been a murmur of protest over this:

The Beatles song Across The Universe will be the first song to be beamed directly into space, NASA has announced.

And yet, surely Led Zeppelin fans would far rather that Stairway to Heaven was beamed into the interstellar reaches to represent our species. And don’t James Blunt fans have anything to say?

But not surprisingly...

The Beatle Sir Paul McCartney said it was an “amazing” achievement and John Lennon’s widow, Yoko Ono, has called it the “beginning of a new age”.

Well, yes... It could ignite an interstellar war if the lyrics of the song are mistranslated. We could look up one day to find a million sleek and horribly beweaponed star cruisers poised to unleash electric death at a single word of command from the leader of the Vl’Hurgs, as he challenges we Earthlings to take back what we said about his mother.

NASA will this week beam the song via its Deep Space Network (that’s the one the Republicans keep threatening to make pay its own way with commercial advertisements). What’s more...

At exactly the same time, fans across the world are being asked to play Across The Universe in a bid to “create a harmonic convergence” around planet earth and throughout the universe.

They stop short of claiming such a “harmonic convergence” will solve greenhouse and ring in universal peace and understanding.

But, hey, this could just work! Please start churning out the Beatles’ Across the Universe on your CD players and iPods immediately, because it’s a happening thing.

Get with the vibe and do it now!!!

Elsewhere, Caz over at avatar briefs gives us an idea of the odds of Across the Universe reaching the ears (or whatever auditory sense organs may obtain) of advanced aliens.

—READ MORE—

Brewed nieflets

Anyone who wasn’t aware that China was ranked 72nd in the world on Transparency International’s Corruption Perceptions Index 2007 would nevertheless probably take the following as indicative of certain problems facing China today:

A Chinese Government website encouraging citizens to report corruption has crashed on its first day under the weight of too many hits.

And the latest round in an argument that has raged for years, and will continue until the day we are either greeted as long-lost celestial brethren, or enslaved or zapped out of existence by the ETs:

Two senior scientists have resigned from an elite international study group in protest over a lack of public discussion about the possible consequences of attracting the attention of aliens by sending signals deep into space.

Almost forgot to mention that Tim Dunlop recently published an urgent News Flash over at his news.com.au gig, as apparently he’d detected some residual confusion over events that occurred almost a month ago.

—READ MORE—

The wonder lives yet

As Chrissy Hinde Oscar Wilde said, we are all of us in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars.

For those of the latter ilk, this week has delivered at least a couple of treats.

Meteor shower to brighten night skies

Stargazers have the chance to spot a meteor shower in the skies tonight.

If the clouds hold off, the annual Geminids meteor shower will be visible to the naked eye from about midnight until dawn.

And it isn’t even Meteorite Monday (remember that?).

Also, Phillip Adams on Late Night Live interviews the esteemed Ann Druyan, co-author with (and widow of) the esteemed Carl Sagan. You can download and hear the podcast from here.

—READ MORE—

“Successful undocking” reported

Yes, space cadets, “the US space shuttle Discovery has successfully undocked from the International Space Station (ISS) to begin a journey back to Earth, space officials said.”

That the “successful undocking” of a spacecraft from a space station is actually newsworthy in 2007 says a lot about the current state of human efforts to colonise outer space.

Particularly given that forty years ago, the great prophet of space-flight Arthur C. Clarke had, in his epic 2001 A Space Odyssey, envisaged scheduled commercial flights between the earth and moon well before now...

Entropy never sleeps.

—READ MORE—

Meteorite Monday

The meteorite auction in New York last week was by all accounts a bit of a dud. Particularly for...

... two meteorites which, though exceptional in size, failed to fetch sky-high prices at auction on Sunday. Bidding for both rocks stalled at around one-third of their valuations, and they were withdrawn from sale at Bonhams auction house in New York.

What’s wrong with these people! Don’t they know that these specimens of pure star stuff are cheap as chips at half the price?

A boffin takes a guess at what may have caused such a spectacular lack of interest:

“So few big meteorites go up for sale that no one really knows what to expect,” says Derek Sears at the University of Arkansas. He feels that an increase in finds from Antarctica and from deserts may have pushed prices down, but apathy may also play a part.

“Some meteorites were last on the market in the post-war years, when public interest in space was at an all-time high.”

People are more blasé about space today, he says.

True, we’re so jaded in the 21st Century; instead of reaching for the stars, we reach for the remote and tune into the faux stars... yes, such as the likes of Paris Hilton.

Entropy never sleeps.

And yes, at time of writing, no living thing today has been documented as being killed by a meteorite. Or even in the last week, perversely enough.

But watch this space, today could be the day. If the rock has my name on it, readers will understand if I don’t post an update.

—READ MORE—