Space & Astronomy/Space and Astronomy (October 1993).iso/mac/TEXT/SPACEDIG/V13_7/V13_758.TXT

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Subject: SPACE Digest V13 #758

SPACE Digest                                     Volume 13 : Issue 758

Today's Topics:
          GEOMAGNETIC STORM UPDATE - STORM HAS ENDED
        Re: IGY and the dawn of the Space Age
               Re: Dark matter
              Re: Fred's Operatic Death
             Re: Access to Space
              Re: Fred's Operatic Death

Administrivia:

    Submissions to the SPACE Digest/sci.space should be mailed to
  [e-mail].  Other mail, esp. [un]subscription requests,
  should be sent to [e-mail], or, if urgent, to
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----------------------------------------------------------------------

Date: Tue, 18 Jun 91 12:11:06 MDT
From: oler <@BITNET.CC.CMU.EDU:[e-mail]> (CARY OLER)
Subject: GEOMAGNETIC STORM UPDATE - STORM HAS ENDED
X-St-Vmsmail-To: st%"[e-mail]"

                       /\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\

                            GEOMAGNETIC STORM UPDATE

                               ALERT CANCELLATION

                       /\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\

                               17:00 UT, 18 June

                                 -------------


STORM UPDATE INFORMATION:

     The minor geomagnetic storm ended early in the UT day of 18 June.
Conditions have now become generally active to unsettled.  Conditions will
remain generally unsettled until 20 or 21 June, when recurrent effects should
begin to increase geomagnetic activity once again.  The peak of the activity
may approach minor storm levels, but is not expected to be significant at
this time.

     Region 6659 passed beyond the west limb on 16 June and is now out of
influential range.  It continued to produce major M-class flares as it passed
beyond the west limb.  Although this region has not been the only region so
far this solar cycle to produce very powerful X-class flares which have
saturated the GOES sensors, it is the only region observed so far this solar
cycle to have produced at least three of these events.  It maintained a
complex configuration as it departed from view on 16 June.  There is a chance
it may return in a configuration capable of supporting isolated major flares,
although there is a stronger chance that it will decay further behind the sun
and will return in a configuration capable of supporting only the lower-level
minor M-class flares.  It will be interesting to observe the return of this
region near 01 July.

     The barrage of major flares which occurred over the last two weeks has
ended.  The regions presently visible are not capable of supporting major
flares.  Isolated low-level M-class events may be observed, but major events
are not expected from the regions visible at the present time.  Proton levels
are still above event thresholds at approximately 15 pfu at greater than 10
MeV.  The satellite proton event should end later this UT day.  The Polar Cap
Absorption (PCA) event ended fairly early in the UT day of 18 June.  Sporadic
localized absorption has been observed since then over the polar regions,
although overall PCA has ended.  Conditions are more favorable for polar path
signal propagation.  Further improvements will occur over the next several
days.

     Solar indices are dropping at the present time, and will continue to
drop towards a rotational minimum between 135 and 150 (for the 10.7 cm solar
radio flux).


The following alerts and/or warnings have been CANCELLED:

   - LOW LATITUDE AURORAL ACTIVITY WATCH
   - POTENTIAL GEOMAGNETIC STORM WARNING
   - POLAR CAP ABSORPTION EVENT ALERT
   - POTENTIAL MAJOR SOLAR FLARE WARNING


The following alert remains IN PROGRESS:

   - SATELLITE PROTON EVENT ALERT (will end shortly)


                       /\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\

------------------------------

Date: 18 Jun 91 19:21:20 GMT
From: sequent!muncher.sequent.com![e-mail]
Subject: Re: IGY and the dawn of the Space Age

In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Dave Dodson) writes:

>There is a major error in this article.  Explorer was von Braun's satellite,

Explorer was a JPL satellite with James Van Allen's instruments.  It was
launched on Von Braun's Jupiter C.  At that time both Huntsville and
JPL were part of the U.S. Army.   Huntsville's mission was building
IRBM's and ICBM's.  There is a famous photo of Von Braun, Van Allen, and
William Pickering of JPL holding aloft a model of the first U.S. satellite
in triumph.   The teamwork between explorers and rocket builders has gone
downhill since then....


--
Nick Szabo            [e-mail]
Embrace Change...  Keep the Values...  Hold Dear the Laughter...
These views are my own, and do not represent any organization.

------------------------------

Date: 17 Jun 91 07:35:21 GMT
From: eru!hagbard!sunic!mcsun!cernvax!chx400!ugun2b!ugun2a![e-mail]
Subject: Re: Dark matter

In article <[e-mail]>, [e-mail] (Lloyd E Vancil) writes:
...
> And I was wondering, why cant "dark matter" be planets, rocks, comets, etc etc?

Heavy atomic elements heavier than He are thought to have been synthesized
mainly by massive stars, because first these stars evolve in a short time
(~10^7 y), and second they eject most of their processed mass back into the
interstellar medium (such as supernovae).  So the possibility of rocky planets
such as the earth depends on the previous evolution of massive stars.  Now,
when stars form from a gas cloud, most of the mass is going into low mass
stars, which evolve very slowly (>10^9 y).  In conclusion it seems very
difficult to make dark matter by mainly heavy elements, because their
processing needs to lock even more mass in low mass stars, for a time as long
or longer than the age of the Galaxy.

    Daniel Pfenniger

------------------------------

Date: 17 Jun 91 13:35:45 GMT
From: cis.ohio-state.edu!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!mips!ptimtc!nntp-server.caltech.edu!sol1.gps.caltech.edu![e-mail]  (Carl J Lydick)
Subject: Re: Fred's Operatic Death

In article <[e-mail]>, [e-mail] writes:
>In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] writes:
>
>>The kind of arrogant attitude you project with statements like "astronaut
>>groupies" and implying that pro-manned space people call finaciers "Bean
>>counters"  makes me discount your arguments.
>
>"Astronaut groupie" is a description based on observations of people
>flocking out to Edwards to watch the Shuttle land, getting astronaut's
>autographs, and worshipping deceased astronauts as martyrs.  This is
>very similar to the behavior of a rock band groupie.   I don't see
>any reason to make my language less descriptive of reality.

Well, then maybe it's time you made a reality check.  I've never been to
Edwards to watch the shuttle land.  If I were to go, it would be to watch the
SHUTTLE land, and if they ever make a remotely-controlled shuttle landing, I
might consider that interesting enough to compensate for the inconvenience and
actually go watch it.  I think far too much has been made of those who died on
Challenger.  They knew the job was dangerous when they took it, and were
adequately compensated (they must have been; they boarded the flight of their
own free will:  nobody put a gun to their heads and told them to get on the
ship or die) for the risks involved. Either that or they were just plain too
stupid to understand what was going on, and I'm disinclined to believe that was
the case.  I've been to exactly one launch, and that was because the payload
for which I work was being launched, and I'd just as soon have seen it launched
on an unmanned vehicle.  I think this sort of attitude qualifies me as not
being an "astronaut groupie".  HOWEVER, I DO WANT TO SEE A PERMANENT MANNED
PRESENCE IN SPACE.  The reasons for this are complex, and don't have anything
to do with groupieism, and I resent it when you describe me, and others like
me, as "astronaut groupies".

>Some of these people do in fact call the politicians who fund their
>programs, and people who keep track of those funds, "bean counters".
>_That_ is arrogance.  There have been at least 3 examples of this
>perjorative in this newsgroup during the last year.  I encountered it
>repeatedly as a member of NSS.   Many do in fact discount scientist's
>opinions while claiming that their projects are for "science".   That is
>hypocrisy.

And a lot of the people who make the decisions ARE bean counters (actually, more
likely, vote counters).  Not all of them, but a sizeable number (or, given a
lot of decisions that have been made, it sure as hell looks that way).  Hell,
it was the bean-counters that managed to turn a basically useful idea (a space
station) into the boondoggle that Fred became.  They decided that to please
enough constituents, they had to try to make Fred all things to all people.
The (very predictable) outcome was a plan for something that wouldn't do
ANYBODY any good.

>The fact that your employer, JSC, gets its revenues via the IRS
>for astronaut projects makes me discount your "pro-manned"
>statements.  Quit wasting my tax money making self-serving posts to the
>net.  Quit wasting my money on engineer-welfare projects like Fred.  Get a
>real job.

Quit wasting your own tax money making self-serving posts to the net that end
up being read by people on the government payroll!  You've wasted more
bandwidth than anybody else I've seen on this group.  It you'd just remove
your irrelevent diatribes and polemics from your posts, you'd cut down the
network traffic on this group by at least 5%.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Carl J Lydick | INTERnet: [e-mail] | NSI/HEPnet: SOL1::CARL

------------------------------

Date: 17 Jun 91 16:50:36 GMT
From: cis.ohio-state.edu!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!caen!ox.com!hela![e-mail]  (Allen W. Sherzer)
Subject: Re: Access to Space

In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] writes:

>We could also have a thriving space exploration
>and science program if the greedy astronaut programs were not soaking
>up the bulk of the funds.

In the short run, yes. In the long run we are far better off building the
infrastructure. Doing so wold reduce costs to LEO and permit a lot more
to be done. Eventually we would get to the point where PhD students could
send their own probes out. That will produce far more results in the long
run than your short term approach.

>The Europeans have quite substantial access to space via Ariane and Giotto,
>et. al., with astronauts nowhere  in sight.

And yet they still feel the need to build Hermes so they can have a manned
program. In fact, ALL the spacefaring nations either have or are building
manned systems at great expense. Perhaps they know something?

  Allen
--
+---------------------------------------------------------------------------+
|Allen W. Sherzer |   DETROIT: Where the weak are killed and eaten.         |
|   [e-mail]   |                                                         |
+---------------------------------------------------------------------------+

------------------------------

Date: 17 Jun 91 16:51:50 GMT
From: mojo![e-mail]  (Doug Mohney)
Subject: Re: Fred's Operatic Death

>In article <[e-mail]>, [e-mail] writes:

>"Astronaut groupie" is a description based on observations of people
>flocking out to Edwards to watch the Shuttle land, getting astronaut's
>autographs, and worshipping deceased astronauts as martyrs.  This is
>very similar to the behavior of a rock band groupie.   I don't see
>any reason to make my language less descriptive of reality.

Gosh Nick, what do you think of Memorial Day? Am I a "military groupie"
because  I go out to Andrews Air Force base, talk with the fighter pilots,
and have respect for their accomplishments?

>The fact that your employer, JSC, gets its revenues via the IRS
>for astronaut projects makes me discount your "pro-manned"
>statements.  Quit wasting my tax money making self-serving posts to the
>net.  Quit wasting my money on engineer-welfare projects like Fred.  Get a
>real job.

I didn't know he was sacrificing his right to free speech just because he works
for the government. He pays taxes too. We all do. Don't pull that "my tax
money" horse-garbage (Posts from Canada and Australia excepted :-).

Personally Nick, I think if we were pouring money into Asteroid Hunting and
someone tried to suggest an alternative such as <gasp> Manned Exploration and a
resuable space vehicle, you'd want to defend your little baby too.

Quit berating him for having a job.

     Signature envy: quality of some people to put 24+ lines in their .sigs
  -- >                  [e-mail]                        < --

------------------------------

End of SPACE Digest V13 #758
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