This week out 5 Facts series continues with our little brother planet – Mars! Seeing Red Mars is famously known as the red planet as its dusty ground is tinged brownish red by iron-oxide (rust). This makes Mars look red to the human eye when we see it in the night sky. Read more…
Would you like to live on Mars? This is a question that we here at the Armagh Observatory and Planetarium ask on a daily basis. There never is a solid yes or no answer from any of the groups we ask, whether they be young or old. We usually Read more…
New Horizon’s arrival at Pluto this year, after a nine year-long traverse through the Solar System has revealed many new things about this little icy planet. Pluto used to be the ninth planet but was demoted in 2006 to the status of dwarf planet. Until the New Horizons mission started Read more…
Mars, our rusty, red neighbour, has long since been a source of fascination for star-gazers, scientists and science fiction fans. This world has sparked the imaginations of many in the hunt for alien life and it may even become a potential astronaut destination in the future. Many robotic rovers have Read more…
Comet ISON is here! This new comet was in January 2013 just a dim speck in the constellation Gemini, between the stars Castor and Pollux. Astronomers could not agree if it was going to develop into the greatest astronomical spectacle in a decade or into a dim and disappointing smudge- Read more…
This year has started off with perhaps a little more promise than the last, not only did the world not end but a new Mayan calendar has started, mysterious planet Nibiru did not crash into the Earth and nor did we get wiped out with any comets/ aliens/ or stellar Read more…
Music can be a great way to relax and unwind. Many people play an instrument, are part of a band or enjoying listening to their favourite song on the radio or TV. The iPod generation have music available to them at any time with their portable devices. Enjoying music however, Read more…
NASA Mars Exploration Program Team are now achieving such a level of accuracy in landing craft on the Martian surface that the targeted landing area for Curiosity was like an arrow hitting the bull’s-eye from hundreds of kilometres away. Proportionally this bull’s-eye equates to a landing zone on Mars measuring Read more…
I had my doubts, but NASA didn’t let us down when the Agency’s Curiosity rover was successfully landed in Gale Crater, Mars at 5.14 UTC on 6 August 2012. The first images are unimpressive (but are of course from the hazcams, small low resolution cameras for evaluating potential Read more…
On 6 August, while many of us are enjoying the Olympics, staff at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory will be nervously watching their monitors, waiting for a message from Mars.If all goes well, their Mars Science Laboratory spacecraft will scream through the tenuous Martian atmosphere, until its parachute cracks open, followed Read more…
What exciting space events has 2012 in store for us? What important space anniversaries are coming up this year? Welcome to our annual guide to what the Universe has waiting ahead! This year marks twenty years since the first extra-solar planets were discovered when a pair of planets were Read more…
“Is there life on Mars?” More than fifty years into the Space Age and there still is no definitive answer. Completing our series of posts on this mystery, we look at the latest ideas about the existence of beings on our neighbouring planet. In the previous part of this Read more…
NASA’s Curiosity Mars rover is to use a unique system called a “sky crane” to touch down next year on the Red Planet. Engineers at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory have just released a video of this previously untried mechanism under test. (UPDATE: it all worked perfectly, for more detail see Read more…
2011 will be a year of exciting and historic upcoming events in space exploration. It is is also a significant anniversary year of some triumphs and tragedies in space history. Here’s a look at what lies in store. This year marks four centuries since sunspots were first observed telescopically by Read more…