Farewell To Cassini

Solar Winds

Storyville - The Farthest: Voyager’s Interstellar Journey

Launched 16 days apart in 1977, the twin Voyager space probes have defied all the odds, survived countless near misses and over 40 years later continue to beam revolutionary information across unimaginable distances. With less computing power than a modern hearing aid, they have unlocked the stunning secrets of our solar system.

The golden record contains greetings in 55 languages, animal sounds and 27 musical clips from around the world, among them Chuck Berry’s Johnny B Goode.

It’s amazing that billions of years from now [after humans are long gone] Voyager will still be chugging along.

“The stars, like dust, encircle me In living mists of light; And all of space I seem to see In one vast burst of sight.”

—

Isaac Asimov

Orion Nebula in Oxygen, Hydrogen, and Sulfur via NASA https://ift.tt/2GB0bRc

The Horsehead Nebula : Sculpted by stellar winds and radiation, a magnificent interstellar dust cloud by chance has assumed this recognizable shape. Fittingly named the Horsehead Nebula, it is some 1,500 light-years distant, embedded in the vast Orion cloud complex. About five light-years “tall”, the dark cloud is cataloged as Barnard 33 and is visible only because its obscuring dust is silhouetted against the glowing red emission nebula IC 434. Stars are forming within the dark cloud. Contrasting blue reflection nebula NGC 2023, surrounding a hot, young star, is at the lower left of the full image. The featured gorgeous color image combines both narrowband and broadband images recorded using several different telescopes. via NASA

The Himalayan plateau, as seen from the ISS by europeanspaceagency

March 2015 Solar Eclipse by NASA Goddard Photo and Video

Greetings to the Universe in 55 Different Languages

Dr. Carl Sagan chaired the committee that organized and produced the Voyager Space Probe’s golden record. Among the contents were Sounds of Earth, a selection of sound bytes including nature, civilization, and humanity, and Greetings to the Universe in 55 Different Languages.

Every person who recorded for this project was given almost total freedom on what to say. They were explained the purpose of the project and asked to keep it brief. These are the genuine responses of each person sending a message to extraterrestrial life somewhere in the stars.

How quickly do we grow accustomed to wonders. I am reminded of the Isaac Asimov story "Nightfall," about the planet where the stars were visible only once in a thousand years. So awesome was the sight that it drove men mad. We who can see the stars every night glance up casually at the cosmos and then quickly down again, searching for a Dairy Queen. (x)