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By European Space Agency
Video: 00:04:31 The double-satellite Proba-3 is the most ambitious member yet of ESA’s Proba family of experimental missions. Two spacecraft will fly together as one, maintaining precise formation down to a single millimetre. One will block out the fiery disc of the Sun for the other, to enable prolonged observations of the Sun’s surrounding atmosphere, or ‘corona’, the source of the solar wind and space weather. Usually, the corona can only be glimpsed for a few minutes during terrestrial total solar eclipses. Proba-3 aims to reproduce such eclipses for up to six hours at a time, in a highly elliptical orbit taking it more than 60 000 km from Earth. The two spacecraft are being launched together by India’s PSLV-XL launcher from the Satish Dhawan Space Centre. Follow the mission’s deployment and commissioning, up to its first glimpse of the corona, in this overview video.
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By NASA
Curiosity Navigation Curiosity Home Mission Overview Where is Curiosity? Mission Updates Science Overview Instruments Highlights Exploration Goals News and Features Multimedia Curiosity Raw Images Images Videos Audio Mosaics More Resources Mars Missions Mars Sample Return Mars Perseverance Rover Mars Curiosity Rover MAVEN Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter Mars Odyssey More Mars Missions The Solar System The Sun Mercury Venus Earth The Moon Mars Jupiter Saturn Uranus Neptune Pluto & Dwarf Planets Asteroids, Comets & Meteors The Kuiper Belt The Oort Cloud 2 min read
Sols 4359-4361: The Perfect Road Trip Destination For Any Rover!
NASA’s Mars rover Curiosity acquired this image of its workspace, which includes several targets for investigation — “Buttress Tree,” “Forester Pass,” “Crater Mountain,” “Mahogany Creek,” and “Filly Lake.” Curiosity used its Left Navigation Camera on Nov. 8, 2024 — sol 4357, or Martian day 4.357, of the Mars Science Laboratory mission — at 00:06:17 UTC. NASA/JPL-Caltech Earth planning date: Friday, Nov. 8, 2024
After the excitement of Wednesday’s plan, it was a relief to come in today to hear that the drive toward our exit from Gediz Vallis completed successfully and that we weren’t perched on any rocks or in any other precarious position. This made for a very smooth planning morning, which is always nice on a Friday after a long week.
But that isn’t to say that Curiosity will be taking it easy for the weekend. Smooth planning means we have lots of time to pack in as much science as we can fit. Today, this meant that the geology group (GEO) got to name eight new targets, and the environmental group (ENV) got to spend some extra time contemplating the atmosphere. Reading through the list of target names from GEO felt a bit like reading a travel guide — top rocks to visit when you’re exiting Gediz Vallis!
If you look to the front of your rover, what we refer to as the “workspace” (and which you can see part of in the image above), you’ll see an array of rocks. Take in the polygonal fractures of “Colosseum Mountain” and be amazed by the structures of “Tyndall Creek” and “Cascade Valley.” Get up close and personal with our contact science targets, “Mahogany Creek,” “Forester Pass,” and “Buttress Tree.” Our workspace has something for everyone, including the laser spectrometers in the family, who will find plenty to explore with “Filly Lake” and “Crater Mountain.” We have old favorites too, like the upper Gediz Vallis Ridge and the Texoli outcrop.
After a busy day sightseeing, why not kick back with ENV and take a deep breath? APXS and ChemCam have you covered, watching the changing atmospheric composition. Look up with Navcam and you may see clouds drifting by, or spend some time looking for dust devils in the distance. Want to check the weather before planning your road trip? Our weather station REMS works around the clock, and Mastcam and Navcam are both keeping an eye on how dusty the crater is.
All good vacations must come to an end, but know that when it’s time to drive away there will be many more thrilling sights to come!
Written by Alex Innanen, Atmospheric Scientist at York University
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Last Updated Nov 11, 2024 Related Terms
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By USH
Over the years, numerous mysterious events have been witnessed in the sky, defying explanation. Recently, yet another unusual sky phenomenon was observed over Southern Australia capturing attention and sparking curiosity.
Video footage reveals what appears to be a dome-shaped structure, with an even stranger detail: lightning seems to bounce off or perhaps even originate from within the dome.
The mysterious formation has led to numerous theories. Some viewers suggest it could be a unique (red) rainbow or a rare weather event like a haboob (sandstorm). Others speculate it might be the result of weather manipulation or even an energy field projected over the region.
Opinions also vary on the lightning, some say it’s bouncing off the dome, while others believe it could be emanating from within. Although it may just be an unusual natural phenomenon, the seemly strange interaction with the lightning remains unexplained.
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By NASA
Curiosity Navigation Curiosity Home Mission Overview Where is Curiosity? Mission Updates Science Overview Instruments Highlights Exploration Goals News and Features Multimedia Curiosity Raw Images Images Videos Audio More Resources Mars Missions Mars Sample Return Mars Perseverance Rover Mars Curiosity Rover MAVEN Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter Mars Odyssey More Mars Missions The Solar System The Sun Mercury Venus Earth The Moon Mars Jupiter Saturn Uranus Neptune Pluto & Dwarf Planets Asteroids, Comets & Meteors The Kuiper Belt The Oort Cloud 4 min read
Sols 4341-4342: A Bumpy Road
This image was taken by Left Navigation Camera aboard NASA’s Mars rover Curiosity on Sol 4329 — Martian day 4,329 of the Mars Science Laboratory mission — on Oct. 10, 2024, at 05:35:08 UTC. NASA/JPL-Caltech Earth planning date: Monday, Oct. 21, 2024
After Curiosity’s busy weekend, the team is ready for another day of planning. We are able to take advantage of the Earth-Mars time offset to full plan on both sols of our plan today. For this plan, I served as Mobility Rover Planner, and planned Curiosity’s drive.
The first sol begins with some remote science. In this block, there is a ChemCam LIBS and Mastcam joint observation of “Ewe Lake,” to look for variation across the different layers in the rock. There is also a ChemCam RMI and a Mastcam of the “Olmstead Point” target, to see if there are chemical differences that make it darker than the surrounding rocks. Mastcam also is taking a stereo image of “Depressed Lake” (in order to see if this loose block belongs to the Stimson or the Sulfate units) and an image of the ChemCam AEGIS target the rover automatically found after the last drive.
After a nap, Curiosity wakes up to do some contact science on the “Chuck Pass” target, which is a piece of bedrock with laminations and nodules. We perform DRT brushing, MAHLI, and APXS observations of this rock before stowing the arm so we can be ready to drive on the second sol. In the late afternoon, to take advantage of the lighting conditions, we have another short set of Mastcam imaging — an atmospheric sky column observation and a stereo mosaic of “Fascination Turret” from this new angle.
The second sol also kicks off with some remote sensing. We follow up the contact science with ChemCam LIBS and Mastcam of Chuck Pass. ChemCam also takes an RMI looking east back to the area of the white sulfur stones below “Whitebark Pass” to get yet another viewing angle. There is also some atmospheric imaging, Navcam deck monitoring (to see how the dust is moving around on the rover’s deck) and a large dust devil survey.
After the imaging, we are ready to drive. This terrain has been very tricky. While the slopes are not steep, this is a very rocky area, as you can see in the image, making finding a safe path difficult. We don’t only need to worry about driving over things that are too big or too sharp, but we also have to make sure not to scrape the wheels along the side of a rock or steer them into a rock, making them wedge and stall. It also means that we do not have good stereo data out very far because the rocks block our view. The last complication is that we have to drive backwards — otherwise, the rover hardware will block Curiosity’s view of Earth during the time we want to send her the new plan. When we drive backwards, the rover hardware will block Curiosity’s view, so we need to turn to get a clear view in our images. We also take additional frames to be sure we can find the best path for the next drive. With all this, we ended up being able to drive about 32 meters today (about 105 feet). After a short diversion to get around a steering hazard, we were able to drive a fairly straight route along the path to our next major imaging stop. After the drive, we have our normal post-drive imaging, including a twilight MARDI image.
We have been lucky so far on this terrain and been able to successfully complete our recent drives. Hopefully this drive will also be successful!
Written by Ashley Stroupe, Mission Operations Engineer at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory
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Last Updated Oct 24, 2024 Related Terms
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By USH
A strange image has been circulating across social media in Thailand, showing a large, dark pillar-like structure mysteriously appearing in the sky over Ubon Ratchathani. According to the photographer, the picture was taken on Sunday, October 20, 2024, while they were trying to capture the "beautiful, colorful sky.
This peculiar sighting isn't entirely unprecedented. Similar strange phenomena have been reported before. On October 7, 2015, a mysterious "floating city" with skyscrapers appeared in the clouds over Foshan, Guangdong province in China. Again, on March 18, 2016, ghostly buildings were seen above the sea along the port of Dalian, in Liaoning Province, China, lingering in the sky for several minutes.
Most recently, on September 11, 2020, an eerie image resembling the Hogwarts School from Harry Potter was spotted hovering over modern buildings in Jinan, Shandong Province. On July 14, 2022, a bizarre occurrence was also witnessed by residents in Haikou, Hainan, where a mysterious floating city appeared in the sky.
Scientists suggest that these events are most likely optical illusions, with mirages being the leading theory. Mirages occur when light rays bend, causing distant objects or parts of the sky to appear displaced. One specific type, known as a Fata Morgana, can create towering, distorted images of distant objects, contributing to these surreal sights.
Although the sightings between 2015 and 2022 were witnessed by many, the photographer in Thailand later realized that the mysterious pillar hadn't been visible to the naked eye at the time. This discovery has led some to speculate that the phenomenon might have been caused by a Project Blue Beam test, holographic technology, or even a temporary vortex connected to a parallel universe.
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