OAS Executive Committee
President- Dave Dunn Ph. (801) 544-7705
Vice Pres- Lee Priest Ph. (801) 479-5803
Secretary- Bob Tillotson Ph. (801) 773-8106
Treasurer- Doug Say (801) 731-7324
Vol. 31 Number 2 November 2001 http://physics.weber.edu/oas/oas.html
NOVEMBER'S MEETING AT
THE OTT PLANETARIUM
The regular meeting of the Ogden Astronomical Society will be held at 7:30 p.m. this Thursday November 8, 2001 in the Layton P. Ott Planetarium on the Weber State University campus. The membership will be treated to a showing of the planetarium's newest program, Images of the Infinite. This new program focuses on some of the finest imagery yet produced by the Hubble Space Telescope.
For those interested in ordering the 2002 issue of "The Year In Space" desk calendar, Alan Jensen will be taking orders at this meeting. Ordering through Alan offers a big discount for club members.
NOVEMBER ACTIVITIES
We have a two night star party on 11/16 and 11/17 at Golden Spike National Historic Site. For directions see their web page at:
http://www.nps.gov/gosp/map/gsmap.html.htm.
The early morning of November 18th is supposed to be a Leonid Meteor Storm. It is predicted that the east coast will see thousands of meteors per hour. Hopefully we will get to see some of this action. If not, we can have a fun all night star party. We will have a pot luck dinner around 1:00 a.m.
2001's ANTELOPE EVENTS CLOSE WITH A FINE OCTOBER SHOWING
The October Antelope Island Star Party was a success. We had good viewing conditions. A lot of members came with telescopes and I enjoyed looking through them and seeing the nice nebulas, galaxies and planets. Thanks go to Gary and Mark for bringing B.O.B., the "radio telescope" out to the star party. (Gary was listening to Weber State's football game and had the radio tucked away inside B.O.B.). Thanks to everyone for supporting the star parties this year.
Dave Dunn
MINUTES
OGDEN ASTRONOMICAL SOCIETY
October 11, 2001
At 7:30 p.m. the meeting of the Ogden Astronomical Society was called to order in room 121 of the Lind Science Center on the Weber State University campus. Due to the size of this evenings attendance, the meeting was relocated from the planetarium. President Dave Dunn opened with welcomes and greetings.
This month's Antelope star party on the 20th will be the last on the island for this year. Tomorrow night, Oct. 12, the OAS is hosting a star party for a Boy Scout group in Ogden. Dave is seeking assistance.
Dr. Sohl discussed recent information of the Project Starshine satellite. Sighting times are available on the "Heaven's Above" web site. The OAS received national attention in the Project Starshine press release. Grand View Elementary school is credited for making most of the mirrors.
Dr. Sohl needs OAS assistance with two star parties scheduled in November. Details forthcoming.
OAS members will soon be invited to take a simulated Space Shuttle trip at the Astro Camp facility in Ogden. Details available at the November meeting.
Sheri Trbovich is preparing to order the Proton Lights. Contact Sheri directly if you are interested.
SLAS member Lowell Lyon discussed the status of the ALCON 2002. Great speakers and a fine week of astronomy is anticipated. Contact your Executive Committee members for further details.
The evenings speaker, Mr. Nal Morris was introduced. His topic is "The Parowan Gap Petroglyphs". Fine presentation and good Q & A.
Bob Tillotson, Secretary
For those not already on the JPL e-mail list, the following was recently received concerning the successful Mars
Odyssey project:
MEDIA RELATIONS OFFICE
JET PROPULSION LABORATORY
CALIFORNIA INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY
NATIONAL AERONAUTICS AND SPACE ADMINISTRATION
PASADENA, CALIFORNIA 91109 TELEPHONE (818) 354-5011
Contacts: JPL/Mary Hardin (818) 354-0344
NASA Headquarters/Donald Savage (202) 358-1547
Arizona State University/Jim Hathaway (480)965-6357
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE October 31, 2001 MARS ODYSSEY'S FIRST LOOK AT MARS IS ALL TREAT, NO TRICK
NASA's 2001 Mars Odyssey gave mission managers a real treat this Halloween with its first look at the red planet. It's a thermal infrared image of the Martian southern hemisphere that captures the south polar carbon dioxide ice cap at a temperature of about minus 120 C (minus 184 F).
The spacecraft first entered orbit around Mars last week after a six-month, 460- million-kilometer (285-million-mile) journey. The image, taken as part of the calibration and testing process for the instrument, shows the nighttime temperatures of Mars, demonstrating the "night-vision" capability of the camera system to observe Mars even when the surface is in darkness.
"This spectacular first image of Mars from the 2001 Mars Odyssey spacecraft is just a hint of what's to come," said Dr. Ed Weiler, associate administrator for space science at NASA Headquarters in Washington, D.C. "After we get Odyssey into its final orbit it will be much closer to Mars than when it took this image, and we'll be able to tell whether or not there are any hot springs on Mars, places where liquid water may be close to the surface. If there are any such locations they would be places we might like to explore on future missions."
The image covers a length of more than 6,500 kilometers (3,900 miles), spanning the planet from limb to limb, with a resolution of approximately 5.5 kilometers per pixel (3.4 miles per pixel), at the point directly beneath the spacecraft.
The spacecraft was approximately 22,000 kilometers (about 13,600 miles) above the planet looking down toward the south pole of Mars when this image was taken.
It is late spring in the Martian southern hemisphere. The extremely cold, circular feature shown in blue is the Martian south polar carbon dioxide ice cap , which is more than 900 kilometers (540 miles) in diameter at this time and will continue to shrink as summer progresses. Clouds of cooler air blowing off the cap can be seen in orange extending across the image.
The Mars Odyssey image is available on the Internet at: http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/images/mars/odyssey_mars.html ,
http://mars.jpl.nasa.gov/gallery/global/PIA03459.html , http://themis.asu.edu/latest , and
http://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/cgi-bin/GenCatalogPage.pl?PIA03459 .
The Jet Propulsion Laboratory manages the 2001 Mars Odyssey mission for NASA's Office of Space Science. The thermal-emission imaging system was developed at Arizona State University, Tempe, with Raytheon Santa Barbara Remote Sensing, Santa Barbara, Calif. Lockheed Martin Astronautics, Denver, is the prime contractor for the project, and developed and built the orbiter. Mission operations are conducted jointly from Lockheed Martin and from JPL, a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena.