Rocket Science for the Rest of Us

So, last week, I mentioned Rob's Uncle John, who was a mission specialist on a couple of shuttle missions, and I suggested he had quite a sense of humor.  (It runs in the family.)  On a whim, I looked him up on YouTube, and wouldn't you know...

Video day today!

First, a look at orbits:

LaGrange points are fun.  Many SF writers use them for space stations.  I have one at L5 in my rescue Sisters universe; it almost gets destroyed in "These Three" in Infinite Space, Infinite God II.

Here's how the L1 point looks.  The lesson talks about the SOHO satellite and its uninterrupted view of the sun.


But more cool than that are the images:


Here's the WMAP, and why it's important, as explained in verse by Charles Osgood. 



And a quick video of the map it's made:



Here's how the LaGrange points 4 and 5 look:

I am still on vacation, so I'm leaving you today with a funny video.  I chose this because it seems to reflect the kind of fun-loving attitude astronauts have.  Why do I think this?  Rob's uncle was a mission specialist on the space shuttle and he said when he filled out the questionnaires and came to the question "Have you ever had amnesia?" he answered, "I don't remember."  Turns out everyone chosen for that mission had given a similar smart-alec answer. 

Not the best quality video, but a good explanation of the slingshot effect.  Incidentally, Bad astronomer has a blog that's worth reading: http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/

In this lesson, we see why the emphasis on apoapsis and periapsis was so important last lesson, as they are used in Hohmann transfers orbits.  Incidentally, Hohmann transfer orbits are used for getting satellites into proper orbits, too.

Something I hadn't realized was that our opportunity to launch to Mars (with the greatest efficiency) comes only once every 25 months.  Our next opportunity is March 2014.  I've got to say, I'm not hopeful we can make it. unless we use a different launch system, like ion drive--but I'm not sure that's going to be ready by 2014, either.  However, here's an interesting look at how it might have worked, based on a 1966 study.  http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2012/04/ernsts-ions-week-concludes-nerva-ion-mars-mission-1966/

I'm on vacation for the month of June, so instead of writing a blog, I'm sending you to read some cool stuff I've discovered.  This time, I'm introducing you to another blog called Colony Worlds:  Seeking Out New Homes on New Worlds.  It's a very cool blog, mostly of news stories on technologies that could assist us in our quest to colonize other planets.  I already had it in my links log, but I think it deserves a highlight.

Check it out here--and tell them I sent you!

Again, I think the class here is pretty self-explanatory, but I had one question:  We can change the orbit by adding energy at any point, not just the apoapsis and periapsis, so what's the big deal?  Basically, these are the times that it's more energy efficient to make changes in the orbit.

I'm on vacation in June, so I'm just leading you to interesting things to read on Fridays.  This one actually came to me in an e-mail from the late Walt Staples.  (Before he dies, not from the grave.)  It's a review of a book on the Asian Space Race published by James Clay Moltz of the Naval Postgraduate school.  (Rob went to this school for Air Command and Staff College and loved it.  He talked about going back to teach there someday.)

Moltz suggests that China isn't just going to start a space race with America or Russia, but with the smaller spacefaring nations like Japan and India.  Maybe after the JPL class, we could take a book like this and do it for Space Studies Tuesdays.  Let me know what you think.

Link to the review here.

Find it on Amazon here.  Kindle Version here.

I know it may seem like I'm copping out by posting videos all the time for these lessons, but I find that they help me visualize the lessons better.  (It actually takes me sometimes an hour or more to find good ones, too.)

Kepler's Laws are pretty easy to understand, I think, but this one explained them nicely.

I still didn't get the tides idea--why was there a second tide on the other side of the Earth?  but I found this truly old film.  It'll take some of you back to middle school science class, I'm sure, but I thought it explained things pretty well:

I'm on vacation in June, so rather than writing my own post, I'm directing you to some fun ones I've found.  Today:  Solar Sails in Science Fiction.  It started with Jules Verne and continues--and it's influences actual science.  Isn't that just like a good SF novel?

Check it out here.