Skyguy – DISPATCH: Hubble Repair!
May 14th
Great news about the Hubble Space Telescope
Yesterday, astronauts aboard the space shuttle Atlantis reached the Hubble and — using the shuttle’s robotic arm — pulled it into the cargo bay. Very, very carefully!
The astronauts are going to give Hubble some important repairs, and also give it some really powerful new equipment.
Hubble was launched into orbit on April 24th, 1990. So last month, it turned 19 years old. So you could say we’re giving Hubble some very cool but slightly overdue birthday presents!
I think Hubble is the greatest scientific instrument ever created.
It is named after the astronomer Edwin Hubble. In [YEAR], he discovered that nearly all the galaxies in the universe are moving *away* from each other — which shows that our universe is expanding.
Since we know that our universe is expanding, it makes sense that this expansion must have had a starting point. Scientists call that starting point of the whole universe the “big bang.”
The Hubble Space Telescope has taken lots of great pictures of stars, nebulae, and galaxies. But it’s also allowed scientists to figure out the age of the universe far more accurately than ever before.
Because of information from the Hubble, we know that our universe is about 13.7 billion years old.
But the Hubble Space Telescope has helped astronomers discover many other very surprising things.
For instance, we know that not only is our universe expanding — but it keeps expanding faster and faster!
Wow!
Here’s what that means: Imagine that you blew up a balloon so much that it popped. Then — instead of the pieces of the balloon slowing down as they move away — they actually sped up!
Let me tell you — plenty of astronomers and scientists were very, very surprised when they saw that!
Using the Hubble Space Telescope, astronomers also learned that supermassive black holes are probably common in the centers of all galaxies.
And in 1994, when comet Shoemaker-Levy 9 hit the planet Jupiter, Hubble took fabulous pictures of this big event. And that was a lucky break for astronomers — it was just a few months after the first time the Hubble got some upgrades and repairs, so it was all ready for action.
So Hubble has been GREAT for astronomers and it will only get better after this week. With repairs and new instruments on board, Hubble is sure to surprise us with great new discoveries about this strange universe we live in.
I’d like to wish the Hubble Space Telescope a very very happy birthday — and I’m looking forward to lots more great pictures and science.
So go outside tonight, look up at the night sky, wave, and yell “HAPPY BIRTHDAY HUBBLE!”
“Is Anybody There” Yes, There Is
May 7th
Yes, There Is
“Hotshots” looks at a movie!
IS ANYBODY THERE? is a film with a fairly familiar story about the contrast between youth and old age, but it has one thing in it that makes it stand out above all the others and that makes it worth seeing: Sir Michael Caine.
Caine doesn’t like to be called “Sir,” even though he was knighted by Queen Elizabeth in 2000, and he doesn’t like to be referred to by his title, which is a Commander of the Order of the British Empire, or CBE.
Pretty good for a Cockney kid who was born Maurice Micklewhite, but who has been making movies for more than 50 years, i’n’t it?
Here he plays “The Amazing Clarence,” a retired magician who checks himself into “a residence home for the elderly” that is run by a young couple with a 10-year-old son named Edward.
Edward isn’t happy to meet Clarence at first, because Clarence is given Edward’s old room, which Edward was hoping he would get back after the previous resident had died in it. In fact, Edward asked his parents, “Can I have my room back now that Arthur’s dead?”
Edward is fascinated with ghosts and the idea of people dying, and he had put his tape recorder under the bed of his room’s previous occupant in order to record the very moment when he died.
Clarence and Edward take a reluctant liking to each other, and Clarence gives Edward some practical advice, telling him, “Your life changes, Buster, and not always for the better.”
Clarence also teaches Edward some magic tricks, which Edward uses at school in order to impress his classmates.
Edward then convinces Clarence to put on a magic show for the residents of the old-folks home, and despite some polite resistance at first, Clarence is eager to perform, but to say that one of his tricks ends not quite how he planned it would be a major understatement.
Along the way, both Clarence and Edward help each other out in their respective troubling times, and you will probably predict how you think the story is going to end, but you could also be very wrong.
You will also never forget who is appearing in the film and what a privilege that is.
IS ANYBODY THERE? answers its own question with a resounding “Yes, there is.”
I’m Dan Culberson and this is “Hotshots.”
“Earth” Tears to Your Eyes
Apr 30th
Tears to Your Eyes
“Hotshots” looks at a movie!
EARTH is a beautiful film that covers the globe from the Arctic to Antarctica and focuses on a family of polar bears, elephants, and humpback whales in the process.
To do so, dozens of film crews used 200 locations in 64 countries, and the result is magnificent.
The film begins in January in the high Arctic where there has been no sun for months.
The narrator, James Earl Jones, says, “Every living thing is waiting.”
Then we see a mother polar bear and her two cubs come our of their den. The mother hasn’t eaten in five months and has lost half her body weight, we are told.
In the meantime, we also see the father polar bear in his solitary search for food, which becomes increasingly difficult because of the melting polar ice.
We see herds of caribou in migration across the tundra and the wolves who shadow them.
At this point, you might ask, “How did they manage to film this?” Stick around for the closing credits, and you will see how those shots were made and some of the dangers that the film crews encountered.
We see baby ducklings and their first flying experience out of the tree, or more accurately, as the narrator says, “falling with style.”
Then we are in the Tropics, where the sun shines 12 hours a day every day, and we see the Birds of Paradise in New Guinea. You can try to ignore the cheap jokes and comments from the narrator, but it is also hard to forget that he was also the voice of Darth Vader, remember?
We travel to the dry season in the Kalahari Desert in southern Africa and pick up a mother elephant and her calf struggling to keep up with the herd on their search for water.
We watch the drama unfold between the hunter and the hunted in extreme slow motion.
The pictures of scenery are majestic and make you appreciate what a wonderful planet we live on, as well as how fragile and dangerous life on it is for us all.
The final family we track is a mother humpback whale and her calf, who have to travel 4,000 miles from their breeding ground to Antarctica in search of food.
EARTH is so moving that it brings tears to your eyes.
I’m Dan Culberson and this is “Hotshots.”
