Happy birthday, Voyager: Probe is NASA’s longest-running mission
The Voyager probes each carry a ‘golden record’ of sighs and sounds from Earth on the off-chance that they encounter life beyond our solar system.
(via silas216)
Source: mothernaturenetwork
The same view of Mount Everest, 88 years apart, affords a striking contrast - and a much diminished glacier.
David Breashears says: “Eighty-six years after Mallory took that photograph, I sat in the exact spot where he had snapped his iconic picture. Pulling out his photo, I was stunned by the changes that had swept over this region. The wide river of ice had retreated more than half a mile, leaving a field of separated ice pinnacles melting into the rocky ground. In the distance, the ice streams on Everest’s flank also had shrunk, exposing more of the mountain’s dark face.” via kqedscience
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Source: The Atlantic
Earth’s inner fires surface at Beppu, a city of spas and mineral springs on Kyushu. There heat seekers resort to the “blood Pond Hell”, whose red clay is used in treatment of skin disease, National Geographic, December 1977
Source: cratered
Newest Canary Island pictured rising from the deep
The recent earthquakes in the Canary Islands of late aren’t due to Poseidon the earth-shaker, but a submarine volcano to the south of the island of El Hierro. Hot magma spewing from beneath the surface of the ocean has injected volcanic chemicals into the water, staining the sea green.
Ocean waters have been churning with heat and seafloor sediment spewed from the volcano’s plume, which stretches tens of kilometres under water. The eruption of magma is venting 50 to 100 meters below the surface, but catapulting volcanic rocks as high as 19 meters in the air. The volcanic activity is warming the waters by as much as 10 degrees Celsius, reports Red Orbit.
The island of El Hierro sits on a tectonic hot spot in the Atlantic Ocean off the coast of Morocco, and the volcano off its shores has been erupting since mid-October.
(via crookedindifference)
A hundred miles above the earth, the Aurora lights up the sky. After travelling millions of miles across space, solar winds, attracted by the magnetic pull of the poles, collide with the earth’s atmosphere. Trillions of charged particles dance across the sky.
Source: frozenplanet
Total lunar eclipse to be visible this weekend
To see the last eclipse of the year, stay up late Friday night or get up early Saturday morning.
From Annie Leonard, co-director of “The Story of Stuff” project (mentioned previously here), comes a companion initiative, “The Story of Broke.”
“The Story of Broke,” told in an eight-minute-long film (watch it here) released today via the Web, calls for a shift in government spending — and our tax dollars — away from an ailing “dinosaur economy” in which some of “last century’s” businesses, including large oil companies and agribusinesses, receive subsidies. The story proposes we invest in the future, allocating more funding to green solutions, such as zero-waste, renewable energy, and energy-efficiency projects.
Leonard says: “It’s time to rebuild the American Dream; but this time, let’s build it better.”
Various environmental groups and economic justice organizations, including the Sierra Club, Friends of the Earth, Good Jobs First, National Priorities Project, and Physicians for Social Responsibility, among others, helped contribute to the story’s script.
The video and the project’s Web site aim to serve as resources and as springboards for discussion and activism. Check them out.
![Sometime today, Earth is going to get cozy with an asteroid, the size of a modern aircraft carrier.
The 70-metre (230-foot) Goldstone antenna, located near Barstow, Calif., will be used to track the flyby of Asteroid 2005 YU55 today. The last time a space rock this big got this close was in 1976. This asteroid, 2005 YU55, will actually pass closer to the Earth than the moon, at about 0.85 the moon’s orbit.
[This] particular asteroid is small enough that it will have no impact on the Earth whatsoever. “We’d be concerned if it hit us or if it came within our atmosphere,” Edwards says. “I’ve seen some rumours that it will cause extra tides. Four hundred metres sounds big, but if it is compared to the size of the moon, it is very small. It will have no noticeable effect on us. It’s not going to cause crazy tides or anything like that. It’s just too small.”
Small or not, this asteroid holds a particular interest for scientists. Edwards says it is quite rare for larger asteroids to get this close to Earth. The last one was 35 years ago and the next isn’t expected until 2028. Read more here.](http://25.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_luco89XcuG1qfjf68o1_500.jpg)
Sometime today, Earth is going to get cozy with an asteroid, the size of a modern aircraft carrier.
The 70-metre (230-foot) Goldstone antenna, located near Barstow, Calif., will be used to track the flyby of Asteroid 2005 YU55 today. The last time a space rock this big got this close was in 1976. This asteroid, 2005 YU55, will actually pass closer to the Earth than the moon, at about 0.85 the moon’s orbit.
[This] particular asteroid is small enough that it will have no impact on the Earth whatsoever. “We’d be concerned if it hit us or if it came within our atmosphere,” Edwards says. “I’ve seen some rumours that it will cause extra tides. Four hundred metres sounds big, but if it is compared to the size of the moon, it is very small. It will have no noticeable effect on us. It’s not going to cause crazy tides or anything like that. It’s just too small.”
Small or not, this asteroid holds a particular interest for scientists. Edwards says it is quite rare for larger asteroids to get this close to Earth. The last one was 35 years ago and the next isn’t expected until 2028. Read more here.
