Luna Faces The Bull

The just-past first quarter Moon in the Hyades (Source: AstroBob)

Got plans for tonight? Got a pair of binoculars and fifteen minutes to spare? Then take a short excursion out into the chill with your loved ones to enjoy the sight of the Moon passing between Earth and the Hyades!

How can you observe this spectacle? Simple; dress warmly, step outside after evening twilight ends,  and find the Moon. Aim your binoculars at Luna, and it should be joined in the field of view by a lovely sprinkling of dim and bright stars. Focus to taste, and enjoy!

The Hyades, the V-shaped "face" of the constellation Taurus the Bull, is actually a star cluster located approximately 150 light-years from the Sun. This makes it the nearest open cluster to the Solar System. While we can see a few dozen individual stars with binoculars there are actually several hundred single and double suns to be found here. A few of these "Doubles" are circled above.

The brightest star to be seen is Aldebaran (a Tauri), which at a distance of 65 light-years is actually not a member of the star cluster. Aldebaran is an older giant star and gleams red only a couple of degrees to the lower left of the Moon;  you can easily spot it with the naked eye!

Anytime this evening you'll be able to step outside and see this lovely event. If you go out several times separated by an hour or so you'll be able to actually see Luna "backing" her way through the cluster, her eastward orbital motion slightly mitigating the effect of Earth's rotation and making the satellite appear to cruise through the Hyades until moonset just after midnight.

It's well worth a look, and I hope you'll have fairly clear skies. Be sure to leave a comment and tell me about your stargazing experience, and of course I welcome your questions!

Photo Of The Day: Pierside Sisters

MSC Sister-ships 'Supply' (left) and 'Arctic' load cargo in a chill winter fog

Photo Of The Day: The View From The Bridge

The lube-oil barge 'Sunny Williams' moors alongside 'Laramie'

The Quiet Hero

I often get in trouble with fellow space hipsters by suggesting that the selection of Neil Armstrong as Apollo 11 Commander (CDR) was a major mistake. Yes, he was an amazing pilot--in a veritable corral full of amazing pilots. Yes, he was an experienced astronaut--and the same caveat applies. But NASA brass were well aware of the fact that he was non-demonstrative (read: introverted), and this MUST have been a discussion point in the selection process: "Do we want the first man to walk on the Moon to be a wallflower?".

The public affairs guys should have at some point noted that he would not be the best ambassador to the taxpayers and the world at large--that maybe you would want a hero who could be seen and perceived by the public as, well, heroic.

No, I'm not suggesting that Edwin "Buzz" Aldrin would have been a better choice; just that the act of choosing a man who shunned the limelight for decades (to the point that the occasional interview was always greeted with surprise and excitement) deprived post-Apollo NASA of an undeniable voice to speak for ongoing lunar exploration and continued deep-space human spaceflight.

So is it possible that Dave Scott, Gene Cernan, Jim Lovell--or even the oft-profane but entertainingly honest Pete Conrad--would have been better options for the Apollo 11 CDR position and the opportunity to frame their own famous words while stepping from "Eagle" onto the lunar surface for the first time? Obviously these men were qualified for the job--and except for Lovell* all of them did leave bootprints in the regolith.

As an alternate-history exercise it's an interesting question to mull, but of course that's all it can be.

I just wonder if, somewhere in the NASA archives, there is a transcript of a meeting where these questions were addressed. Was there ever a discussion back in the late 1960s of whether a shy, retiring astronaut who always tended to avoid the public gaze was, in the long term, the right man to be the First Man?



Neil Armstrong aboard Apollo 11, en route the Moon

* Lovell would go on to command Apollo 13, the ill-fated mission would fail to land on the Moon but return the three-man crew safely to Earth, earning it the sobriquet of the space agency's Finest Hour.

Lunar Eclipse In Brief

12:15 AM. 19 Degrees Fahrenheit with a brisk wind--Brrrrrr! I reluctantly left our warm bed (two humans and two bulldogs can generate a LOT of thermal energy--enough that we usually turn the heat entirely off at bed-time!) to brave the tundra of our backyard and view the Total Lunar Eclipse.

Just beautiful! The deep orange disk of Luna surrounded by the bright stars of Gemini and Canis Minor, themselves bracketed by the shivering bare branches of our two ancient oaks, the moaning of the wind blending into harmony with the murmur of distant highway traffic to provide an eerily appropriate soundtrack for the scene.

I stood transfixed by the tableau, telescope and camera forgotten for long minutes until the cold, cutting through my thick robe like a blade, finally broke the spell. I spent a few minutes with the camera, framing and capturing a few images before fleeing inside to our thick quilt and warm sleeping companions.

Waking later to the scent of fresh coffee, I noted the brilliant moonlight pouring in through our bedroom's westward-facing window. As dawn approached Luna was putting on yet another display--shining through the branches of our neighbor's pines in a farewell salute before the coming of day.

Cartoon Physics, part 1

Children under, say, ten, shouldn't know
that the universe is ever-expanding,
inexorably pushing into the vacuum, galaxies

swallowed by galaxies, whole

solar systems collapsing, all of it
acted out in silence. At ten we are still learning

the rules of cartoon animation,

that if a man draws a door on a rock
only he can pass through it.
Anyone else who tries

will crash into the rock. Ten-year-olds
should stick with burning houses, car wrecks,
ships going down -- earthbound, tangible

disasters, arenas

where they can be heroes. You can run
back into a burning house, sinking ships

have lifeboats, the trucks will come
with their ladders, if you jump

you will be saved. A child

places her hand on the roof of a schoolbus,
& drives across a city of sand. She knows

the exact spot it will skid, at which point
the bridge will give, who will swim to safety
& who will be pulled under by sharks. She will learn

that if a man runs off the edge of a cliff
he will not fall

until he notices his mistake.
 

Nick Flynn, tiré de Some Ether (2000)

"River-Boat"

USNS Laramie in the Mediterranean, Dec 2018

This is my ship, USNS Laramie (T-AO 203). She is my job, my office and my home for up to ten months a year, operating in home waters off the coast of Virginia, ranging north and south along the east coast of the United States, or deploying around the world to the Indian Ocean or Mediterranean Sea. I have many friends amongst her crew, people I admire and respect, and for the most part I find the experience of sailing and serving in this naval auxiliary to be rewarding and enjoyable.

She's far from my first ship, but after two years aboard I think I can safely say that she's a 'keeper'. I'm planning to stay with this particular "River Boat" (so-called because most Navy Oilers are named for rivers in the United States) for as long as I can. It seems to be a good match so far!

I usually see her from the inside; it's nice to come across a beautiful photograph from the perspective of another ship making her approach to receive fuel and cargo. This image was taken by an officer aboard the Spanish Frigate Reina Sofia; I think it captures my current nautical girlfriend very nicely.

It's also cool to know that one of those dots on the bridge wing (directly above the orange-topped lifeboats) is yours-truly!