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Eclipse Today, Meteor Shower Friday
Many people wrote in with these links: Today (Wednesday) BBC has streaming video of the total solar eclipse visible from England to India. Friday the 13th, starting at 0300 US EDT, NASA will post live shots from the Perseid meteor shower taken from a camera mounted on a high-altitude balloon. Check the links for details galore. It's an excellent week for space and astronomy buffs online!
I was looking to the next ridge of fields to the west, and there was a big spot of direct sunshine (lucky people). I could also see a few other fields further north and west.
Right before the totality the field about 5 Kms west just faded out, and then a second later we got into darkness ourselves, so I missed that moment where the last bead of light winks out. I made up for it by seeing the sun re-appear, so I didnt see if there was a wave of light rushing to the west.
There were too many clouds around the area to properly see the shadow. I've seen the shadow approach in another eclipse years ago in North America, where we had a good clear sky. But it happens so fast you have to decide where you are going to be looking, either up or in the direction of the shadow.
The bad part about having a sky mostly filled with clouds was no interference patterns on the ground. In an eclipse with a clear sky, there are wavy light patterns all over everything. Its a pretty cool side effect.
the AC
Hemos is like...sci-fi fans;he thinks technology is cool, but he hasn't bothered to understand the science it's based on
Outside of a little village called Villers-la-Chevre (the goat village).
There was a few hundred blue sky seekers there, most drove up in the last few minutes before totality. But the big spot of blue sky kind of filled up at the last minute as the temperature dropped. Not bad enough to miss any of the eclipse.
Hemos is like...sci-fi fans;he thinks technology is cool, but he hasn't bothered to understand the science it's based on
I noticed no difference in the light at all in Stockholm, although I was having Lunch outdoors throughout the entire thing. I guess its not that surprising, 70% is not reffering to the strength of the light.
:-).
I wasn't looking at the Sun itself (I'm committed to destroying my eyes by stairing at small text on a monitor, nothing else), but people who did did see something of a moonshadow.
However, the weather here was perfect
Eclipse update: Apple PR stunts shocks World
I'm sure Nostradamus fanatics will claim afterwords that Nostradamus' 1999 prediction was a prediction of the JFK jr. plane crash or something.
Nostradamus' quantrains are like poetry, and are cryptic. I've seen many predictions of the future based on them (Killer Earthquake in CA in 1988, etc.) all have failed.
But people claim afterwords that he predicted things like the death of Princess Di, because they found a quantrain that sounds like that event. I've even found someone who claimed that one quantrain predicted the Pentium bug! The same quantrain has been interpreted by others to be a prediction of the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
Even if Nostradamus's "Centuries" do predict the future, they're pretty useless because nobody understands what they mean. Personally, I think he deliberatly wrote a book of giberish poetry, knowing how gullible people are.
Of all the comments I've ever posted, this is definately one of them
I don't know about the Aztec calendar, but the Mayan calendar ends in 2011 or 2012 (depending on who you listen to)
;-)
Also I think there is a planetary alignment called the "great cross" sometime this week, and NASA's Cassini space probe, which is carrying a large quantity of plutonium, is supposed to flyby earth next week, within only a few hundred miles (to use Earth's gravity as a boost to go deep into space).
Some speculate that the Cassini space probe will crash into Earth, causing a major environmental disaster, NASA says that there is no problem. Nostradamus says that the "King of terror" will "come from the sky" during or after the seventh month of 1999.
In short, it's an interesting week!
Of all the comments I've ever posted, this is definately one of them
It's either 2011 or 2012, on either Dec 22, 23, or 24, or maybe July... (depending on who's counting)
Anyway they say that the Mayan calendar is more accurate than our own.
So here's my question:
If it's so accurate, why can't we even figure out the exact day it ends?
Of all the comments I've ever posted, this is definately one of them
Wow - are the bits in secti on 6/8 talking about Bill Gates (antichrist), or what!!! I liked the bit at the end about the length of the antichrist's reign... ;)
,hacker Perl another Just)'
perl -e 'print scalar reverse q(\)-:
Matt. Want XML + Apache + Stylesheets? Get AxKit.
He doesn't actually say "July" he says "seven months", and he doesn't say during the seventh month, so he could mean after seven months. Also he doesn't say 1999 AD, so he could mean 1999 years after he made the prediction or something.
Anyway, we do know that he was an astrologer, and as such could predict eclipses, planetary conjunctions, etc through non-supernatural means, so he probably figured out that there would be an eclipse across Europe in 1999 (he lived in France)
I don't really believe that Nostradamus could predict anything. If you wrote a book of 900+ Giberish verses, I'm sure I could convince people that you predicted things because some of your verses are remarkable close to real events.
Of all the comments I've ever posted, this is definately one of them
I guess it's because the moon doesn't have a perfect orbit. As I understand it, the moon doesn't actually revolve around the Earth, but instead sort of waves around (well that's the best I can describe it) earth's orbit. There is a Solar Eclipse every month, but most times to view it you'd have to leave the planet.
Also, some guy posted there was going to be a lunar eclipse too tonight.
You're right, that is impossible, I think there was one at the end of July though (25th?)
There are between 2 and 7 eclipses every year (counting both Solar and Lunar). 5 is the max number of Solar Eclipses in a year (according to NASA's page)
Of all the comments I've ever posted, this is definately one of them
Check this out: ;-)
Nostradamus predicted the Pentium bugOf all the comments I've ever posted, this is definately one of them
Was out in eastern france earlier today, beat the traffic out there by leaving last night, then spent the morning finding a place with some sunshine.
I was up on the top of a ridge with a few hundred other people spread around the fields. We were able to see the shadow coming at us across the fields right as the sun winked out. Then there was a lot of cheering and horn honking, and when the light came back 2 minutes later everyone just went wild.
The temperature dropped from 17 C at 11:00, to 12 C during the eclipse, then went back up to 21 later in the day. And the clouds got thicker as the temperature dropped, which made it a bust for most people.
The corona was amazing. It was so bright in the sky, but everything else around was dark. Didn't see any stars or planets, but that was because there were still too many clouds in the area, and most of the time I was looking at the corona through a thin cloud.
And the GSM telephone network was saturated for about 20 minutes, as everyone phoned everyone else to swap stories.
It took 7 hours to get back to Paris, the traffic was pretty dense. Millions of dutch and germans heading north, millions more parisians heading home. What was wild is that everyone seems friendly today on the roads, having all been out to share a common experience.
Thats all from france,
the AC
Hemos is like...sci-fi fans;he thinks technology is cool, but he hasn't bothered to understand the science it's based on
m. Wealthy U.S. businessman a closet revolutionary and Nazi
Ip. 154 (cV-75)
A very wealthy and famous businessman in the U.S. will be secretly involved with the American Nazi Party and the Ku Klux Klan in the south. The man's sole ambition in life is to overthrow the American government as it is presently constituted. The man will be involved with politics but will stay low-key, spinning webs of power and expanding his influence behind the scenes. This groundwork will prove useful for the Antichrist later on. The man will have a puppet, a figurehead, but he will pull the strings. The link will not be known until the time of the Antichrist.
Does that give you the chills or what? Wonder if it's Billy G..
...sorry, I was just so proud of myself for figuring out your acronym. :)
Save the whales. Feed the hungry. Free the mallocs.
--
The solar eclipse should be visible along a line from 450 miles east of NY (in the atlantic) through India. If you live in Europe, there's a good chance you'll see atleast a partial eclipse if its not cloudy. Also, tonight for us Americans, there's a Lunar eclipse. It takes an hour or so for it to completely cycle, but it still looks pretty cool. When you view these things, try to visualize it in 3D, it makes it much cooler.
A Lunar and Solar eclipse only occurrs when the Moon is full (or close to full) and its axis of revolution is even so that it falls along the same plane as the Sun. Just thought I'd drop some info out there.
I think here in Boston there would have been about an 80% eclipse at sunrise, unfortunatly, I slept through it. It's cloudy anyway
Of all the comments I've ever posted, this is definately one of them
"...From the sky will come large Roy deffrayor..."
Ya gotta watch out for Roy Deffrayor, I tell ya. Ol' Roy's a real tough cookie.
His friend, Roy D'Angolmois, ain't no picnic either.
I hear that their Aunt's not so bad, though.
Save the whales. Feed the hungry. Free the mallocs.
pøh, we americans aren't that dumb :P
well some of us aren't anyway.
10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1)); : GOTO 10
Hopefully NASA's coverage of the Perseid meteor shower will include tracking of the Cassini space probe that'll be passing through it on the 17th/18th. Y'know, the one loaded with 72 pounds of plutonium 238?
I'd sorta like to know whether or not there'll be a massive ecological disaster next week.
Another damned comic
+++ NO CARRIER
I haven't verified this but if I remember correctly this Friday is the end of the Aztec calendar. The end. The calendar just stops. I don't know how but it does. So my question is: does anyone know if these meteors are just a little bit bigger than usual? :-)
Leknor
http://Leknor.com
"So many idiots, so few comets"