IYA Live Telescope – Kaguya Impact: 18:30 UT / THE MOON
Written by Tammy Plotner
The Japanese lunar orbiter Kaguya will end its two-year mission with a controlled impact on the Moon’s surface on June 10th at 18:30 Universal Time. The impact location is near the southeast limb at 80ºE, 63ºS. If you live in Asia and Australia, you may have the opportunity to observe the impact event… And if you don't? Then watch on our IYA Live Telescope! We're focused on the Moon right now and keeping our fingers crossed the clouds stay away….
Thanks for stopping by! We opened up all the extra room we had on our server for the day to accomodate as many people as possible.
Well, we tried our best – and here's the results.
Did we catch it? Doesn't look that way… But neither did telescopes 5 times larger than what we're using. The point is, we tried! One of our friendly photographers was also on the job, so once he's reviewed his footage for the night, perhaps he managed to catch a flash. If so, we'll share!
In the meantime, thank you so much for tuning in and we'll keep those cameras rollin'!
Filed under: IYA Live Telescope Library
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June 10th, 2009 at 10:33 am
Too many users?
Noooo!
June 10th, 2009 at 4:57 pm
Thanks go out to Tammy and all the dedicated people who had a hand in trying to image this admittedly elusive target. The mere fact that many of you made the effort speaks volumes of the enthusiasm among many amateurs and professionals. Hopefully, useful images will surface over the next few days
. Nancy, Btw, what is the aperature and focal length of the scope you were using, again?
June 10th, 2009 at 9:15 pm
I'm left wondering that the impact could not have been controlled for a better viewing opportunity.. when it was presumably planned well ahead, if only as an option to follow the successful completion of primary mission objectives.
The 'Deep Impact' mission shows the finesse that's possible with premeditated impact, so what limited the precision of this one?
Was it really of a scale that amateur-scopes could observe? Surely at least some (Japanese) high-end scopes were catered to, for optimal viewing/imaging ? ..after all, it was done for 'scientific' purposes wasn't it?
..it wasn't just a "let's make a bang!" idea some nerds thought of as they flung their junk behind them at the end of their visit!
If the ET equivalent of Smokey the Bear is watching, I hope he realises this is a legitimate and necessary preliminary experiment for the grand vision of Human expansion through the Solar System and beyond! …though visions of a Lunar future resembling an auto-wrecker's yard flashed through my mind….
Would it be too early now for us to be seriously considering such things in our plans as, pardon the pun, …environmental 'impact', ..and 'bang' for the buck? (…or Yen)
I wonder if seismographic measurements by previously landed instuments utilised this opportunity of slamming several billion Yen's worth of nearly 3 tonnes of Earth-matter into Selene at 6,000 kph… or thereabouts.. ?
Hollywood and CGI adequately serve the 'spectacle and circuses' the populous require for their daily bread in the 24hr entertainment-cycle, …but an 'experiment' like this, ..what reams of data it must have gathered!! …yes??
…ouch! my cheek is nearly perforated!
But rather than concede this episode was as culminating to science as was 'the Fonz jumping shark' was to "Happy Days" ..or that we should all go and drink poisoned fruit juice and wait for the UFO to pick us up….
I'd like to be reassured it wasn't all just an Adam&Jamie blast-fest tweeted to the gelatinous masses of the quivering status to keep the quo….
…let's not allow science to become mortgaged to sub-prime agenda and market forces. fun is fun, but promise has no value if it's not kept. …tomorrow's space adventure will wither if today's surface-scratchings demonstrate folly… and rampant fantasy passes for "engaging" young minds toward science……
Kaguya, ..is it more than a pyrotechnic flick of a cigarette-butt by some 'cool' character into the gutter of some soulless urban street.. to 'awe' the adolescent in-betweens,neither 'at home' with their parents nor 'out in the universe' and 'happening' with their projected potential selves…. is it more than a distraction until it's too late.. a 'rinse and repeat'..
…or is it science and advancement?
Oh foo! ..I can't think in this din!
"Where's the pictures ?! Where's te pictures ?!" …short attention-span/too much infotainment.. "What's on channel 228?"