Our planet’s history includes episodes of cold so extreme that glaciers reached sea level in equatorial regions. Source: https://earthsky.org/earth/whats-coldest-earth-has-ever-been…
Tag: Falls
How To Fall 35,000 Feet and Survive
Massachusetts-based amateur historian Jim Hamilton, who developed the Free Fall Research Page — an online database of nearly every imaginable human plummet, documents one case of a sky diver who, upon total parachute failure, was saved by bouncing off high-tension wires. Contrary to popular belief, water is an awful choice. Like concrete, liquid doesn’t compress. Hitting the ocean is essentially the…
AEgIS on track to test freefall of antimatter
It’s a fundamental law of physics that even the most ardent science-phobe can define: matter falls down under gravity. But what about antimatter, which has the same mass but opposite electrical charge and spin? According to Einstein’s general theory of relativity, gravity should treat matter and antimatter identically. Finding even the slightest difference in their free-fall rate would therefore lead to…
Full Wolf Moon falls in late January 2021
Enjoy the full-looking moon in late January 2021, as this nocturnal sun brings some good cheer to the Northern Hemisphere’s long winter night. Source: https://earthsky.org/tonight/full-wolf-moon-in-late-january-2021…
New evidence for multiple ice ages on Mars
Earth has had at least 5 major ice ages. Now it appears Mars – the next planet outward from the sun – has undergone anywhere from half a dozen to 20 ice ages in the past several hundred million years. Source: https://earthsky.org/space/new-evidence-for-multiple-ice-ages-on-mars…
Mercury’s greatest evening elongation January 23-24
Mercury will be at its greatest elongation January 23. Source: https://earthsky.org/tonight/mercurys-greatest-evening-elongation…
Moon, Mars, Uranus January 19, 20, 21
Over the next several evenings – January 19, 20 and 21, 2021 – let the moon show you the red planet Mars, and then use Mars to find the distant ice giant planet, Uranus. Source: https://earthsky.org/tonight/moon-mars-uranus-january-19-20-21…
Tonight is New Year’s Eve in the Julian calendar
Happy Julian New Year! January 13, 2021, marks the last day of the year in the old-style Julian calendar. Why, and what happened when the calendars switched. Source: https://earthsky.org/tonight/julian-calendar-new-years-eve…
The long decline of Arctic sea ice
Forty years of satellite data show that 2020 was just the latest in a decades-long decline of Arctic sea ice. Source: https://earthsky.org/earth/decline-of-arctic-sea-ice-1979-2019…