2 JUL 2024 · Atira, named for the Pawnee goddess of Earth and the Morning and Evening Star orbits the Sun inside of our path.  Atira, the first of this type of asteroid, was discovered by the Lincoln Near-Earth Asteroid Research Program using telescopes in New Mexico. Atira is a stony object more than a mile in diameter, spins on it's axis of rotation once every three hours, has an irregular shape, and orbits the Sun once every 233 days. This asteroid was named Atira who is a goddess of the Native American Pawnee tribe. She is the wife of the creator god, Tirawa [Tire a wa]. She is the goddess of Earth and the Morning and Evening star.

28 JUN 2024 · Since larger space rocks are rare, it was surprising when my Catalina Sky Survey teammate Hannes Groller found a half mile diameter asteroid traveling through the constellation of Auriga.Fortunately on it’s current path 2024 JW1 can’t come closer than 53 lunar distances from us. Asteroid hunters will continue to track 2024 JW1 to make sure that it does not become a threat as it passes near Earth, Mars , and Jupiter.

25 JUN 2024 · Egg rock's chemical composition and visual appearance is so different from other native Mars rocks that scientists have concluded that it is a meteorite which came from the molten core of an ancient asteroid. 

21 JUN 2024 · My Catalina Sky Survey teammate Kacper Wierzchos was asteroid hunting in the constellation of Draco with the Steward Observatory Bok 90 inch telescope on Kitt Peak, Arizona when he discovered a faint fuzzy object moving through the night sky.Given the global warming which is happening in 2024 one has to wonder about the state of humanity and our home planet when comet C/2024 G1 (Wierzchos) returns to the inner solar system in 3331 CE.

18 JUN 2024 · It was murky cloudy night on Mt. Lemmon where I was trying to find Earth approaching objects with the Catalina Sky Survey 60 inch telescope. At about 1AM another hole in the clouds opened and I could see stars on the all sky video camera. On this fourth attempt, one set of images showed a bright rapidly moving object. Followup observations by my teammate Greg Leonard using the Catalina Sky Survey 40 inch telescope next door and two different observers in Japan provided the data which allowed the Minor Planet Center to calculate an orbit, estimate a size, predict its path in the sky, and give it the name 2016 VA. Twenty hours after I discovered it, Dr. Gianluca Masi using the Virtual Telescope Project facility 56 miles south of Rome, Italy, repeatedly imaged 2016 VA as it made an 11 minute passage through the Earth's shadow. He used these images to make a remarkable video of this tiny asteroid as it passed through the Earth's umbra. It was the fastest asteroid that he had ever tracked. Fortunately a bit after this video, 2016 VA missed the Earth by about 59,000 miles while traveling at a speed of 13 miles per second relative to us. In 2024 it will once again come near to both the Earth and our Moon.

14 JUN 2024 · My Catalina Sky Survey teammate Jacqueline Fazekas was asteroid hunting with our small but mighty Schmidt telescope on Mt. Bigelow, Arizona when she spotted and then reported a bright moving point of light in the night sky to the Minor Planet Center.Given the rate of human caused climate change one has to wonder about the state of our planet in January of 2163 when 2024 ER is predicted to pass safely some 66 lunar distances from humanity.

11 JUN 2024 · My Catalina Sky Survey teammate Rose Matheny had no way of knowing that the fast moving point of light that she had just discovered would create such a stir. Rose sent in her discovery and followup observations to the Minor Planet Center where astronomers calculated that her discovery would make a very close approach to Earth about two days later and gave it the name 2016 RB1. More than two dozen observatories around the world tracked 2016 RB1 as it came towards us.

7 JUN 2024 · In an astonishing rebirth, the Mayall 4-m telescope has jumped to the forefront of astronomy once again because it is sturdy and precise enough to carry the massive Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument which routinely obtains the spectra of 5,000 galaxies simultaneously.

4 JUN 2024 · More than 400 years ago Galileo Galilei expanded human vision using a telescope to view the cosmos. Since then humans have extended their senses to view the Universe in x-rays, ultraviolet, infrared, radio, and other portions of the electromagnetic spectrum not accessible to our senses. In a pioneering effort, Ekaterina Smirnova has employed the spectroscopy, magnetometry, and molecular data collected by the Rosetta spacecraft to create watercolor paintings, sculptures, a musical collaboration, and an augmented reality project to create new art forms. She has also taken Rosetta data obtained from it's close up observations of comet 67P to create interactive art which uses a smart phone app to experience scientific results in a completely new way.

31 MAY 2024 · The Cosmic Campground International Dark Sky Sanctuary and the Aldo Leopold Gila Wilderness in New Mexico are gateways to nature where man is only a visitor.These New Mexico neighbors give us a sense of wonder, glimpses of history, new knowledge to mitigate the effects of man’s excesses, and many other opportunities we are yet to fully appreciate.