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MISSING SUPERNOVAS:
Astronomers have long believed that stars explode in the Milky Way
about once every 50 years. Yet the last time anyone actually witnessed
a supernova was in the year 1680. Where are all the missing supernovas?
At long last, NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory has found one: full
story.
LUNAR TRANSIT:
Last night, the International Space Station flew over Slovakia--and
right in front of the Moon. A team of astronomers led by Roman Piffl
had their Nikon
D200 ready and they caught the winged silhouette passing just
south of the Sea of Tranquillity:
Photo Credit: Roman
Piffl, Tomáš Maruška, Ivan Majchrovič, Miro Grnja
"It was really amazing!" says Piffl. "We were on
the centerline of the transit 20 km southeast of Bratislava, the
capital of Slovakia."
Now is a good time for Europeans to see the International Space
Station with their own eyes. For the next two weeks, the behemoth
spacecraft will be making a series of bright flybys of Europe, sometimes
three or four times a night. Try our new global Satellite
Tracker to find out when to look.
SOLAR VORTEX:
"In spite of solar minimum, there seems to be plenty of action
on the sun," reports amateur astronomer Peter Schlatter of
Wohlen, Switzerland, who yesterday witnessed a spectacular vortex
swirling on the sun's eastern horizon. Click on the image to launch
a movie he made using his backyard telescope and a Coronado
solar filter:
movie formats: Quicktime,
mp4, avi
Indeed, the limb of the sun is where the action is. "A huge
prominence emerged today looking like a monster rising from a sea
of fire," reports David Leong of Hong Kong: photo.
None of this activity is explosive or threatening to cause geomagnetic
storms on Earth--it's just a pretty show. If you have a solar telescope,
take a look.
more images: from
Pascal Paquereau of Mouzeuil-Saint-Martin, Vendée, France; from
Mark Seibold of Oregon; from
Maxim Usatov of Prague, Czech Republic; from
C. Miller, C.Lyons, B. Atkins, J. Odong and J. Stetson of South
Portland, Maine; from
Dave Gradwell of Birr Ireland; from
Cai-Uso Wohler of Bispingen, Germany; from
Anthony Jennings of North Manchester UK; from
Peter Paice of Belfast, Northern Ireland; from
Patricia Cannaerts of Belgium;
April
2008 Aurora Gallery
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