April 20, 2015 - Mr. Hubble’s Telescope

Mr. Hubble’s Telescope  Named for Edwin Hubble, the pioneering astronomer whose study of the expanding Universe revolutionized modern astronomy, the Hubble Space Telescope turns twenty-five this week. Fittingly, Hubble (the telescope) has revolutionized nearly every area of astronomy, from the solar system (where it watched the aftermath of comets impacting Jupiter), to the very edge of the visible universe (which Hubble indicates is more than thirteen billion years old). Said to have been responsible for more discoveries than any other scientific instrument in history, Hubble on several occasions has stared into a seemingly empty patch of sky and revealed a field brimming with galaxies, some of which date back to the first half-billion years after the Big Bang, as in this Hubble Ultra Deep Field image.

Image Credit: NASA, ESA, H. Teplitz & M. Rafelski (IPAC/Caltech), A. Koekemoer (STScI), R. Windhorst (Arizona State University), Z. Levay (STScI)

Weekly Calendar

April 20-26, 2015

Holidays - Sky Events - Space History

 

Monday 20

1972: Apollo 16 lands on Moon

Tuesday 21

Venus 7° north of Aldebaran
Venus 7° north of Moon
Lyrid meteor shower

1997: Cremated remains of 24 people launched into orbit aboard Pegasus rocket in first space funeral

Wednesday 22

Lyrid meteor shower

2010: X-37B spacecraft launched

Thursday 23

1858: Max Planck born
1962: Ranger 4 launched
1963: M2-F1 lifting body first free flight
1996: Priroda module launched to Mir space station

Friday 24

1970: China becomes fifth nation to launch its own satellite
1990: STS-31 Discovery launched

Saturday 25

Astronomy Day (Spring)

First Qtr Moon 7:55 PM ET

1962: Second Block I Saturn C-1 (SA-2) launched
1990: Hubble Space Telescope deployed
2003: ISS Expedition Seven crew launched on Soyuz TMA-2

Sunday 26

Juno 0.1° north of Moon
Jupiter 5° north of Moon

1920: Shapley-Curtis debate on the nature and distance of spiral nebulae
1993: STS-55 Columbia launched