New NASA satellite blasts off on space-map mission
OPS_admin | Dec 14, 2009 | Comments 0
NASA launched Monday a new breed of satellite called WISE on a mission to orbit Earth and map the skies to find elusive cosmic objects, including potentially dangerous asteroids.
The Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer (WISE) will use infrared rays to map the locations and sizes of roughly 200,000 asteroids and give scientists a clearer idea of how many space rocks loom and what danger they pose.
“When we find them, we will give the information to policy-makers to decide what to do to try to prevent these near-Earth asteroids colliding with our planet,” NASA public affairs officer J. D. Harrington told AFP.
The launch, which had been delayed from Friday after problems were discovered in a rocket booster steering engine, went ahead flawlessly at 6:09 am (1409 GMT) from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California.
WISE, which has been called “the most sensitive set of wide-angle infrared goggles ever,” will orbit 300 miles (500 kilometers) above Earth's surface for 10 months as it hunts for and collects data on dim objects such as dust clouds, brown dwarf stars and asteroids in the dark spaces between planets and stars.
Full Story New NASA satellite blasts off on space-map mission – Yahoo! News.
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If we don't change our ways soon...
A new report by the Royal Society, chaired by Nobel prize-winning biologist Sir John Sulston warns that world population must be stabilized and consumption in wealthy nations must be reduced or the entire planet is in big trouble. As the report reads: "The number of people living on the planet has never been higher, their levels of consumption are unprecedented and vast changes are taking place in the environment. We can choose to rebalance the use of resources to a more egalitarian pattern of consumption... or we can choose to do nothing and to drift into a downward spiral of economic and environmental ills leading to a more unequal and inhospitable future."This is the same warning that President Jimmy Carter gave Americans back in the 1970's - but it was ignored when Ronald Reagan came to power with a "more positive" message basically telling Americans we can do whatever we want. And then after 9/11 - Bush told us all we should go shopping and consume ever more.And now with corporations calling the shots in Washington - long-term sustainability of the planet takes a back seat to short-term profits. If we don't change our ways soon - and embrace clean, alternative energy and educate women around the plant - then we all could be headed for a rough century.-Thom(Is there any chance we will learn in time? Tell us here.) -
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