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Blue Moon Rounds Out The DecadeLos Angeles (SPX) Dec 30, 2009 As twilight descends on New Year's Eve of 2009, a full Moon will rise in the eastern sky for the second time this month (the first time came on December 2nd). Many people use the expression "once in a blue Moon" to mean something that occurs rarely, and you might be tempted to call December 31st's full Moon a "Blue Moon" too. While the former meaning can be traced back centuries, the latter definition is much newer - and it's wrong! "In modern usage, the second full Moon in a month has come to be called a 'Blue Moon.' But it's not!" says Kelly Beatty, Senior Contributing Editor for Sky and Telescope magazine. "This colorful term is actually a calendrical goof that worked its way into the pages of Sky and Telescope back in March 1946, and it spread to the world from there." ... read more |
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Beijing (XNA) Dec 30, 2009China planned to launch the Chang'e-2, the country's second lunar probe, at the end of 2010, the State Administration of Science Technology and Industry for National Defense said Monday. The Chang'e-2 was to test key soft landing technologies for theChang'e-3 and provide high-resolution photo images of the landing area, the administration said. China has made progress on six key tech ... more  
Kourou, French Guiana (SPX) Dec 30, 2009The final Ariane 5 launch for 2009 lifted off Dec 18s from Europe's Spaceport in French Guiana on a journey to place the French military reconnaissance satellite Helios-2B into Sun-synchronous polar orbit. Flight V193 was the seventh Ariane 5 launch of 2009 and used the last of the GS version of the launcher. Liftoff of the 49th Ariane 5 mission took place at 17:26 CET/Paris (16:26 UTC; 13 ... more  
El Segundo CA (SPX) Dec 30, 2009Boeing has received the first on-orbit signals from DirecTV 12 nine hours after launch, indicating that the satellite is healthy and operating normally. DirecTV 12 is a Boeing 702 commercial satellite that will provide consumer television programming to millions of U.S. households. DirecTV 12 lifted off on an International Launch Services Proton Breeze M vehicle on Dec. 28 at 4:22 p.m. Pac ... more |
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  Voyager Makes An Interstellar Discovery   Mini-Research Module MRM1 At Cape For Shuttle Processing   Instant online solar energy quotes Solar Energy Solutions from ABC Solar |
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Baikonur, Kazakhstan (SPX) Dec 30, 2009International Launch Services (ILS), a leading mission and launch services provider for the global commercial satellite industry, successfully carried the DIRECTV 12 satellite into orbit today for DIRECTV of El Segundo, California, on an ILS Proton. This was the seventh and final commercial launch of 2009 for ILS and the 56th ILS Proton launch overall. ILS Proton launched the DIRECTV 10 sa ... more  
Brisbane, Australia (SPX) Dec 28, 2009University of Queensland researchers are testing new materials to withstand the extreme heat experienced by hypersonic vehicles in flight so they can fly for substantially longer. Previous Australian experimental flight tests of scramjets, a type of very fast jet engine, have not lasted longer than five seconds. The tests, conducted at Woomera in South Australia over the past eight years, have used scramjet engines made of conventional materials which have problems with extreme heat including melting, and are not designed for re-use. ... more  
Chiba, Japan (AFP) Dec 28, 2009Japanese researchers said Monday they had developed a "hummingbird robot" that can flutter around freely in mid-air with rapid wing movements. The robot, a similar size to a real hummingbird, is equipped with a micro motor and four wings that can flap 30 times per second, said Hiroshi Liu, the researcher at Chiba University east of Tokyo. It is controlled with an infrared sensor and can ... more |
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  You couldn't make it up: offbeat stories from 2009   Cassini Team Showcase Saturn Moon Movies And Raw Images  Three NASA space missions planned for 2010 |
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