My Science School

Neil Armstrong was a NASA astronaut most famous for being the first person to walk on the moon, on July 20, 1969. Armstrong also flew on NASA's Gemini 8 mission in 1966.

In 1962, Armstrong was selected to be part of NASA's second group of astronauts, who flew on the two-seat Gemini missions to test out space technology, and the three-seat Apollo missions that ultimately took 12 people to the surface of the moon. Armstrong's first flight was as command pilot of the Gemini 8 mission in March 1966 — the sixth crewed mission of that series. 

Armstrong and pilot David Scott completed the first orbital docking of two spacecraft, joining their Gemini 8 spacecraft to an uncrewed Agena target vehicle. However, the two-man crew experienced a serious problem when a thruster on the Gemini 8 spacecraft became stuck open. With the astronauts whipping around faster than one revolution per second, Armstrong managed to gain control again by using the re-entry system thrusters. The event was the first serious emergency in space and although the mission ultimately ended safely, the spacecraft was forced to splash down early because the re-entry system was already expended.

Armstrong also narrowly avoided a nasty accident in May 1968, this time within Earth's atmosphere, while flying the Lunar Landing Research Vehicle — a machine that could fly somewhat like a lunar module and simulate landings on the moon. Fuel for the attitude thrusters ran out and Armstrong was forced to eject just seconds before the vehicle crashed, NASA reported. Armstrong escaped unharmed.

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Neil Armstrong and his fellow Apollo 11 crew Buzz Aldrin and Michael Collins autographed hundreds of envelopes which their families could sell and make money in case they didn’t return home during the moon mission in 1969. As the astronauts could not afford life insurance, Neil came up with the idea considering the extreme danger they were about to face. Fortunately, those autographed envelopes weren’t needed, as the astronauts returned safely to Earth after the moon-landing feat.

Armstrong's envelopes have spent decades as a family heirloom. Now they're giving one away for a good cause. The family donated the envelope to be auctioned off to support the Astronaut Scholarship Foundation, The money will go towards building a legacy of new firsts, whether it's the first manned mission to an asteroid, to Mars or beyond. The foundation, established by the Mercury 7 astronauts, promotes educational opportunities in the sciences.

This is the first time one of the envelopes has been offered up by the Armstrong estate, but previous envelopes have sold for thousands of dollars at auction. The minimum bid for the Armstrong envelope is $15,000. It's the crown jewel of the auction, which also features an opportunity to have dinner with Jim Lovell for a minimum bid of $4,500.

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The Chelyabinsk meteor was a superbolide that entered Earth's atmosphere over Russia on 15 February 2013 at about 09:20 YEKT (03:20 UTC). It was caused by an approximately 20 m (66 ft) near-Earth asteroid with a speed relative to Earth of 19.16 ± 0.15 kilometres per second (60,000–69,000 km/h or 40,000–42,900 mph). It quickly became a brilliant superbolide meteor over the southern Ural region. The light from the meteor was brighter than the Sun, visible up to 100 km (62 mi) away. It was observed over a wide area of the region and in neighbouring republics. Some eyewitnesses also felt intense heat from the fireball.

The object was undetected before its atmospheric entry, in part because its radiant (source direction) was close to the Sun. Its explosion created panic among local residents, and about 1,500 people were injured seriously enough to seek medical treatment. All of the injuries were due to indirect effects rather than the meteor itself, mainly from broken glass from windows that were blown in when the shock wave arrived, minutes after the superbolide's flash. Some 7,200 buildings in six cities across the region were damaged by the explosion's shock wave, and authorities scrambled to help repair the structures in sub-freezing temperatures.

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On December 18, 2018, a space rock entered Earth’s atmosphere and exploded over the Bering Sea with the force of roughly 10 atomic bombs, but went undetected. This was said to be largely because of its remote location, miles away from inhabited land. Then how do we know about it? NASA’s Terra satellite and Japan’s Himawari 8 satellite spotted it. The fireball blast was the second most powerful explosion of the 21st Century.

Various monitoring groups regularly survey the sky for near-Earth asteroids, says Chris Mattmann at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory. NASA uses a monitoring system that scans a catalogue of known asteroids for possibilities of future impacts over the next century.

Small objects frequently hit Earth, says Brandon Johnson at Brown University in Rhode Island. “If you go out on a clear night, you’ll see little meteoroids burning up in the atmosphere,” he says. And because 75 per cent of Earth is covered by oceans, many go unreported.

Larger impacts are rarer, because bigger asteroids are less common. But data from sky surveys of asteroids of between 5 and 50 metres in diameter suggest that these objects should hit Earth less frequently than they actually do.

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A sculpture on the Moon commemorates fallen astronauts. The 8.5 cm Fallen Astronaut sculpture by artist Paul Van Hoeydonck commemorates those who have died in the name of space exploration. The small figure depicts an astronaut in a spacesuit. In 1971, the number of astronauts who lost their lives was 14, and in their honour, the crew of Apollo 15 placed the sculpture next to a plaque listing the names of the eight American astronauts and six Soviet cosmonauts who died in service.

The project was done in secrecy, and it wasn't until after Apollo 15 had landed safely back on Earth that the existence of the sculpture was revealed.

But Van Hoeydonck claims he didn't know that the statue would be used to commemorate astronauts, he didn't approve of the name Fallen Astronaut, and he didn't even intend for the statue to be left lying down.

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A "blood moon" happens when Earth's moon is in a total lunar eclipse. While it has no special astronomical significance, the view in the sky is striking as the usually whiteish moon becomes red or ruddy-brown. 

The next blood moon will happen during the total lunar eclipse of May 26, 2021, which will be visible from parts of North America, Australia, the Pacific and Asia. As the full moon phase passes through Earth's shadow, viewers will be treated to a celestial sight that won't appear again until May of 2022.

How red the moon appears can depend on how much pollution, cloud cover or debris there is in the atmosphere. For example, if an eclipse takes place shortly after a volcanic eruption, the particles in the atmosphere will make the moon look darker than usual.

While there are planets and moons all over the solar system, only Earth is lucky enough to experience lunar eclipses because its shadow is just large enough to cover the moon completely. The moon is slowly drifting away from our planet (at roughly 1.6 inches or 4 centimeters a year) and this situation won't persist forever. There are roughly two to four lunar eclipses every year, according to NASA, and each one is visible over about half the Earth.

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A lunar eclipse occurs when the Moon moves into the Earth's shadow. This can occur only when the Sun, Earth, and Moon are exactly or very closely aligned with Earth between the other two, and only on the night of a full moon. 

The Moon can also look reddish because Earth’s atmosphere absorbs the other colors while it bends some sunlight toward the Moon. Sunlight bending through the atmosphere and absorbing other colors is also why sunsets are orange and red.

During a total lunar eclipse, the Moon is shining from all the sunrises and sunsets occurring on Earth!

You might be wondering why we don’t have a lunar eclipse every month as the Moon orbits Earth. It’s true that the Moon goes around Earth every month, but it doesn’t always get in Earth’s shadow. The Moon’s path around Earth is tilted compared to Earth’s orbit around the Sun. The Moon can be behind Earth but still get hit by light from the Sun.

Because they don’t happen every month, a lunar eclipse is a special event. Unlike solar eclipses, lots of people get to see each lunar eclipse. If you live on the nighttime half of Earth when the eclipse happens, you’ll be able to see it.

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