Armed Polite Society
Main Forums => The Roundtable => Topic started by: MillCreek on September 14, 2017, 01:50:05 PM
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http://www.npr.org/2017/09/13/550711289/saturns-strangest-sights-as-captured-by-a-doomed-spacecraft?utm_medium=RSS&utm_campaign=science
The video is well worth five minutes of your life.
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Yes, it was worth the five minutes. Cool stuff.
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Thanks for posting. =)
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That was cool. For me, the hexagonal storm especially so. Not just in trying to contemplate its size, but its shape as well. Maybe it is controlled by the great machine. :)
(https://pre02.deviantart.net/3def/th/pre/f/2012/016/8/a/_old_2011__the_great_machine___babylon_5_wip1_by_todayv4-d4mklos.jpg)
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Thank you for posting, that was really excellent.
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PBS has been running this for a couple of days now:
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/space/death-dive-to-Saturn.html (53:10)
An hour-long NOVA special with much more. Much sadness in the ground crew, which has been working with the probe practically since it was launched.
Ben's interested in the Hexagonal storm (I am, too), but I wondered about the little "propeller planets" (moons, actually) trying to form in the rings:
https://www.space.com/8731-giant-propellers-discovered-saturn-rings.html
Apparently, gobs of the ring particles are trying to accrete, and this may provide a picture of why the solar system is the way it is.
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That was great.
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I would want my ashes to be on board....
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That pale blue dot:
(https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/71/PaleBlueDot.jpg)
Earth
End of mission:
Disposal - Controlled Re-Entry into Saturn
Last contact - September 15, 2017 (11:55:46) UTC
[Orbital] Decay date - September 15, 2017 (10:31) UTC
Plutonium fuel:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cassini%E2%80%93Huygens#Plutonium_power_source
Last I heard, each one could still generate about a horsepower each.
Terry, 230RN
PS. Horsepower, just to note how far we've come since:
The term was adopted in the late 18th century by Scottish engineer James Watt to compare the output of steam engines with the power of draft horses. It was later expanded to include the output power of other types of piston engines, as well as turbines, electric motors and other machinery. :D
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I would want my ashes to be on board....
Space X and Blue Origin have a new marketing opportunity.
Imagine your ashes burning up over Saturn or Jupiter. Yeah, it will take a few years, but what's the rush? You're already dead.
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In a few years we'll have
STAR TREK MMMXKDLCIVVV -- HAVEN'T WE DONE THIS BEFORE?
In which the crew of the Enterprise is sent to intercept one VERY pissed off, all knowing, space probe named Cassin'gr...
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In a few years we'll have
STAR TREK MMMXKDLCIVVV -- HAVEN'T WE DONE THIS BEFORE?
In which the crew of the Enterprise is sent to intercept one VERY pissed off, all knowing, space probe named Cassin'gr...
"Mr. Spock, you think you can figure out what the hell is on this stupid-looking gold disc?"
"It's just illogical random squiggles, Captain. There appears to be no way to weaponize it."
"Yeah, I thought so." <drops disc into waste disposal chute> "Mr. Sulu, set course to Procyon IV, standard Warp."
<fade to long shot of disc emerging from Enterprise's garbage chute, spinning around, starting on yet another teraparsec journey to... the final frontier>
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"Mr. Spock, you think you can figure out what the hell is on this stupid-looking gold disc?"
"It's just illogical random squiggles, Captain. There appears to be no way to weaponize it."
"Yeah, I thought so." <drops disc into waste disposal chute> "Mr. Sulu, set course to Procyon IV, standard Warp."
<fade to long shot of disc emerging from Enterprise's garbage chute, spinning around, starting on yet another teraparsec journey to... the final frontier>
If it was Pioneer 10 or 11...
<fade to shot of Capt. Kirk quietly removing the gold plaque with the nude man and woman on it, to take it to his quarters for "later"...>
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^ "If it was Pioneer 10 or 11... "
Poetic / science fiction / imaginative leap license.
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"<fade to shot of Capt. Kirk quietly removing the gold plaque with the nude man and woman on it, to take it to his quarters for "later"...>"
Funny, but EW!
:rofl: :rofl:
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"<fade to shot of Capt. Kirk quietly removing the gold plaque with the nude man and woman on it, to take it to his quarters for "later"...>"
Funny, but EW!
:rofl: :rofl:
Wrong color, it would have to be green for Kirk to take that much of a liking to it. ;)
bob
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Green Lives Matter
REF:
http://thegreengirlmovie.com/r-i-p-yvonne-craig-2nd-star-trek-green-girl-to-susan-olivers-original/?i=1
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Wrong color, it would have to be green for Kirk to take that much of a liking to it. ;)
bob
:facepalm: That was Captain Christopher Pike.
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:facepalm: That was Captain Christopher Pike.
Yes it was.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5dNGU772_cI
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Plutonium, intentional crash...sounds like an interplanetary dirty bomb to me.
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Yeah, 35kg of pretty much spent plutonium over a planet that big.
Dilution is the pollution solution.
Terry, 230RN
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Proofreader's / editor's eyeballs waking up this AM:
Why did they call it "re-entry" into Saturn?
How do you "burn up" your ashes?
<sips coffee>
<contemplates the "Oh, you know what I mean" demon and Humpty Dumpty's remarks about meaning>
<thinks about going out for a steak and eggs breakfast except Davie's Chuck Wagon Diner doesn't open until 6 AM on Sunday and it's now only quarter 'till five>
Terry
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I suppose the lefty anti nuke crowd is still angry about the nuclear powered Cassini. What a silly squabble that was.
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I suppose the lefty anti nuke crowd is still angry about the nuclear powered Cassini. What a silly squabble that was.
Well, there have been "incidents" with these power supplies --enough to keep us on our toes, I guess.
One in particular was "amusing" in a "man proposes, G-d disposes" sort of way:
One RTG [Radioisotope Thermoelectric Generator], the SNAP-19C, was lost near the top of Nanda Devi mountain in India in 1965. It was stored in a rock formation near the top of the mountain in the face of a snowstorm before it could be installed. It was supposed to power a CIA automated station for collecting telemetry from a Chinese rocket testing facility.
The seven capsules[34] were carried down the mountain onto a glacier by an avalanche and never recovered.
It is most likely that they melted through the glacier and were pulverized, whereupon the 238 plutonium - zirconium alloy fuel oxidized [ "and mixed with ?"] soil particles which are now apparently moving in a plume under the glacier.
(Extensively edited by 230RN for clarity. See original):
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radioisotope_thermoelectric_generator#Radioactive_contamination
Or maybe that should be, "CIA proposes, China disposes."
It's hard to believe the Chinese were not well-aware of this project, and, you know, it's not all that difficult to start an avalanche all innocent-like. :D
Terry, 230RN
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Given how much radiation Saturn generates all on its own, plus the fact that there's no actual land masses on Saturn, no one is ever going to have to worry about that Plutonium.
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the controversy over Cassini's Plutonium power was all political, there was Zero scientific basis for the kerfuffle.
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Does anyone else remember the conspiracy theorists who believed that the Plutonium in Galileo's RTG's were going to stellate (turn into a star) Jupiter? :rofl:
https://phys.org/news/2014-02-jupiter-star.html
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the controversy over Cassini's Plutonium power was all political, there was Zero scientific basis for the kerfuffle.
Since when is it required that Sturmandrung over radioactive isotopes have any actual scientific basis?
It's RADIOACTIVE!!!! OMG! IT WILL KILL EVERYTHING! IT WILL DESTROY THE WHOLE UNIVERSE!!!
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Well, I gotta laugh... not that I'm actually concerned about "stellating" Jupiter or Saturn.
I mean, scientists thought the extra neutron in Lithium-7 didn't matter, either. See Castle Bravo.
And according to what I read, there are only two known stellar fusion reactions, the CNO (carbon-nitrogen-oxygen) cycle, and the proton-proton (deuterium) reaction.
Note the "known." [tinfoil]
I'm not signing this one so nobody will accuse me of being actually paranoid, when it's simply that I'm amused by the know-it-all arrogance of a lot of scientists.
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Well, I gotta laugh... not that I'm actually concerned about "stellating" Jupiter or Saturn.
I mean, scientists thought the extra neutron in Lithium-7 didn't matter, either. See Castle Bravo.
And according to what I read, there are only two known stellar fusion reactions, the CNO (carbon-nitrogen-oxygen) cycle, and the proton-proton (deuterium) reaction.
Note the "known." [tinfoil]
I'm not signing this one so nobody will accuse me of being actually paranoid, when it's simply that I'm amused by the know-it-all arrogance of a lot of scientists.
Yeah, but the temperature ranges and pressures needed for fusion are well known, and there's lower limits even for the "trick" forms of fusion. Or the isotopes etc. needed for the "trick" forms of fusion don't exist in sufficient abundance in nature. And of course the Plutonium in an RTG wouldn't ever go critical during entry, it'll just burn up and erode away. And Pu 238 that's used in RTG's is the wrong kind for a bomb, you need Pu 239 for that. And Pu 239 is no good for RTG's.
And of course, Shoemaker-Levy smacked Jupiter harder than the entire world's nuclear arsenal detonated at once, and did that a dozen-odd times to boot. And nothing happened other than some black cloudy spots that dispersed in a few days.
Interesting fact, in terms of diameter/size, Jupiter is about as "big" as planets, even brown dwarfs, and the smallest M class red dwarf stars. Add about 8x Jupiter masses, and it'll be on the lower threshold for a brown dwarf, but still be roughly the same diameter. Add 80x Jupiter's mass in one spot, and you'll get a red dwarf star, but any of these objects won't be much more than 10% larger in volume max.
Jupiter is already crushing it's interior into liquid/metallic hydrogen, so when you imagine the proverbial "5lbs of crap in a 3lb sack" scenario of having 8x to 80X of Jupiter's mass all stuffed in close to the same volume, and on the high end of that you've got a star undergoing fusion, you realize how hot and dense the insides of stars are. And why the photons produced by the fusion take anywhere from 4000 to 1,000,000 (free mean path for the photons means there's going to be a statistical spread...) years to escape into space.
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Well, there's no logical way to argue that we know all the possibilities, is all I'm saying. At least not until sample N = population n.
https://gizadeathstar.com/2012/07/they-just-cant-seem-to-get-lithium-7-right/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Castle#Test_execution
Castle Bravo is only my current favorite example of where scientific dogma trumps finding out the True State Of Affairs. The whole phlogiston theory, with its rather rancorous arguments, is another one, though it is now passé.
Note I'm not saying that I fear(ed) igniting Saturn's atmosphere, just that we don't know for sure that it won't due to some bizarre unknown, unconsidered "Holy Sh t" reaction process.
Ahem, koff-koff, as in the Castle Bravo test, even though one scientist advanced the possibility that the reaction might "go big."
Well, son of a bitch ! It did !
I believe there was concern about the Trinity test "igniting" the atmosphere, and they rechecked their assumptions and went ahead with the test. Not without a little brow-wiping, I'll wager.
Let's face it. There's a reason they call them.... "tests."
Terry "not a conspiracy theorist, but merely an amused observer of scientific antics," 230RN, :D