God Bless America

Mar. 11 2000

From NASA

* Aurora Watch-Alert for Tonight 
* Climate & Weather notes 
* Space Weather News
* Jupiter Stories: Moons & Magnetosphere Study 
* New Photos from Mars Global Surveyor 
* White House Women's History Proclamation Honors NASA Women 
* Hubble Images a Reflection Nebula in Orion 
* Chandra Images Continue to Amaze 
* Billions and Billions of Miles Traveled-20-Year-Old Spacecraft Still In Operation 
* Massive African Dust Storm Over the Atlantic

Aurora Watch, March 10/11, 2000: Residents of northern Europe, Canada, and the northernmost tier of US states should be on the alert for possible auroral activity tonight. The interplanetary magnetic field as monitored by NASA's ACE spacecraft developed a southward-directed component earlier today. This condition often means that solar wind plasma can penetrate Earth's magnetosphere and trigger geomagnetic disturbances. NOAA space environment satellites show an expanded auroral oval at 2304 UT on March 10. To monitor developments, please visit http://www.spaceweather.com 

CLIMATE NEWS NOTE: Without El Nino to spice up life along the Gulf Coast, it's been "a boring year" for thunderstorm watchers, say scientists who have found an interesting correlation between El Nino and lightning. FULL STORY at http://spacescience.com/headlines/y2000/essd08mar_1.htm 

SPACE WEATHER NEWS: Predicting solar activity can be tricky, but space weather forecasters have found a new way to anticipate the future. A technique called helioseismic holography will allow scientists to see active regions on the far side of our star before they rotate around to face Earth. FULL STORY at http://spacescience.com/headlines/y2000/ast09mar_1m.htm 

Jupiter's moons: Powerful tidal forces from Jupiter have molded two of the solar system's most bizarre worlds, fiery Io and icy Europa. Images released this week reveal new details of tidal action on the two moons. FULL STORY at http://spacescience.com/headlines/y2000/ast08mar_1.htm 

Magnetosphere Study: NASA's durable Galileo spacecraft is joining forces with Saturn-bound Cassini on a mission to study Jupiter's magnetosphere -- the biggest thing in the solar system. How big is it? If Jupiter's magnetosphere were visible, it would appear to be larger than the Sun or Moon in spite of its great distance from Earth. This story also includes plasma wave sounds recorded by Galileo in 1996 as it sailed past Jupiter's largest moon Ganymede. Galileo will swing past Ganymede two more times before the end of 2000.FULL STORY at http://spacescience.com/headlines/y2000/ast10mar_1.htm 

New pictures from NASA's Mars Global Surveyor spacecraft show exotic terrain made of dry ice near the Red Planet's south pole. Differences between the north and south poles suggest that the opposite ends of Mars have had divergent climates for thousands or perhaps even millions of years. FULL STORY at http://spacescience.com/headlines/y2000/ast09mar_1.htm 

White House Women's History Proclamation Honors NASA Women

President Clinton opened his Proclamation of Women's History Month 2000 by praising NASA astronauts and holding them up as examples of how far women have come. The President referred to a photo, taken during Space Shuttle mission STS-96 in 1999. Astronauts Ellen Ochoa, Julie Payette, and Tamara Jernigan are shown aboard Discovery displaying the National Women Voters League banner as their way of honoring the women who came before and struggled for women's rights. Throughout the month of March NASA is marking the past and present achievements of women in the aerospace field.

Hubble Images a Reflection Nebula in Orion

Just weeks after NASA astronauts serviced the Hubble Space Telescope in December 1999, the Hubble Heritage Project snapped a picture of NGC 1999, a nebula in the constellation Orion (photo shown on Today @ NASA web page). Like fog around a street lamp, the reflection nebula shines only because the light from an embedded source illuminates its dust; the nebula does not emit any visible light of its own. NGC 1999 lies close to the famous Orion Nebula, about 1,500 light-years from Earth, in a region of our Milky Way galaxy where new stars are being formed actively.

Chandra Images Continue to Amaze

After approximately six months of operation, the Chandra X-ray Observatory, the world's most powerful telescope, continues to exceed expectations in search of the mysteries of the universe. It is revealing much new information about black holes, exploding stars, hot gases, and powerful galactic winds. A Chandra image of the galaxy cluster Abell 2142, shown on the web page, shows a colossal cosmic "weather system" produced by the collision of two giant clusters of galaxies. Abell 2142 is six million light years across and contains hundreds of galaxies and enough gas to make a thousand more. It is one of the most massive objects in the universe.

Billions and Billions of Miles Traveled

Three of NASA's interstellar spacecraft -- Pioneer 10 and Voyagers 1 and 2 -- are still working after more than two decades in space. Ground controllers recently commanded Pioneer 10 to maneuver so that its signal could be better heard on Earth. The spacecraft is so low on power that its transmitter had to be turned off to allow it to execute the maneuver. After 90 minutes of blind flight, the transmitter was turned back on and Pioneer signalled the maneuver was complete. Because of the distance from Earth -- 6.8 billion miles -- the signal was received on Earth more than 10 hours after Pioneer sent it.

Massive African Dust Storm Over the Atlantic

A huge sandstorm blowing off the northwest African desert has blanketed hundreds of thousands of square miles of the eastern Atlantic Ocean with a dense cloud of Saharan sand. The massive nature of this storm was first seen when it reached over 1000 miles into the Atlantic on Feb. 26 by NASA's Sea Viewing Wide Field-of-View Sensor (SeaWiFS) spacecraft. An image on the Today @ NASA page, captured recently, shows the dust and sand blowing north and east to the coast of Portugal. Recent studies by the U.S. Geological Survey have linked the decline of the coral reefs in the Caribbean to the increasing frequency and intensity of Saharan Dust events.

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Submitted by
CMDR Constance Sanders
USS Yorktown
Chief, Space Activities Committee, SFC
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