The Astronomy Show 15.07.19

The Astronomy Show 15.07.19

On the Astronomy Show today there will be a big focus on the Moon for the reason that we are very close to the 50th anniversary of the Apoll 11 landing with Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin walking on the Moon. With this in mind our lead story today is about the Moon with news that India is planning to lauch their second mission to the Moon, this is the Chandrayaan 2 mission and if successful India will become the fourth country to make a soft landing on the Moon.

There will be the regular round up of what is happening in the night sky this week, the Moon attracts the atention again because there will be a partial eclipse of the Moon on the 16th July, this will be visible from Britain. The giant planets Jupiter and Saturn can still be seen as soon as it becomes dark.

The usual round up of astronomy news includes details of  the launch of the Spektr-RG Russian X Ray telescope, and the Japanese Hayabusa 2 mission which has grabbed  a second sample from the Ryugu asteroid. The astronomical scrapbook looking at anniversaries this week is dominated by the Apollo 11 Moon landing but other events were happening including in 1994 comet Shoemaker Levy 9 started to crash into Jupiter. All this plus the round up of news from the astronomical societies in the north of England.

The Astronomy Show, every Monday evening between 7.00 pm and 9. 00 pm only on Drystone Radio 103.5 FM. The show can be heard live on line at www.drystoneradio.com or you can listen to the show later on the Drystone Radio podcast.

The Astronomy Show 08.07.19

The Astronomy Show 08.07.19

On the Astronomy Show today I will be looking at news that the Euro Mars Lander suffered damamge during testing when its parachute failed to deploy properly. Mars has been the planet where around half the missions have failed and having a parachute system not working correctly is a recipe for another disaster, engineers will be checking to see what happened.

I will be taking my usual look at what can be seen in the night sky during the next 7  nights including details of how to find Saturn which is now at its best and news that the first sunspots of the next cycle have been seen.

The astronomy news includes details that scientisit have found that mould found on the International Space Station is very hard to kill in space and another mysterious deep space flash has been observed, this time its host galaxy has been traced.

The astronomical scrapbook looking at anniversaries that occured this week include in 1979 Voyager 2 reached Jupiter, Telstar was launched in 1962 and in 1965 Mariner 4 reached Mars, there will also be the usual round up of news and events from the astronomical societies of the north of England.

The Astronomy show every Monday evening between 7.00 pm and 9.00 pm only on Drystone Radio 103.5 FM. You can hear the show live on line at www.drystoneradio.com or listen to the show later on the Drystone Radio podcast.

The Astronomy Show 01.07.19

The Astronomy Show 01.07.19

On the Astronomy Show today I will be looking at news that NASA is planning to send a drone to exlpore Titan the largest moon of Saturn. Apart from  Earth, Titan is the only other body in the solar system that has flowing liquid on its surface, but rather than water it is Methane as it is  much too cold on Titan for water.

I will take a look not just at the night sky this week, but what we might expect to see during the summer momths as the summer constellations can be seen at their best during July. On July 4th the Earth is at its farthest point from the Sun during its yearly orbit. I will be looking at why when the Earth is furthest from the Sun we have summer in Britain.

The other regular features include news that Mars may have escaped life threatening impacts early on and a mysterious extragalactic flash has been pinpointed for the 2nd time. The astronomical scrapbook looks at events that happened this week in history including in 2004 the Cassini probe reaching Saturn and the Crab Nebula was first seen in 1054. There will also be the usual round up of news from the astronomical societies in the north of England.

The Astronomy Show every Monday evening between 7.00 pm and 9.00 pm only on Drystone Radio 103.5 Fm The show can be heard live on line at www.drystoneradio.com or you can listen to the programme later on the Drystone Radio podcast.