March 21, 2010    -    March 27, 2010
(Week 12)
Public Access

Category: All Eclipses History Launches Moon Phases NASA History Night Sky Events Planetary Missions Space Shuttle Launches

Category: All

Description:

(1684) Dione (dye-oe'-nee) is a moon of Saturn discovered by Giovanni Cassini in 1684. It is named after the titan Dione of Greek mythology who (with Zeus) created Aphrodite. It is also designated Saturn IV.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dione_(moon)

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(1685) Tethys is a moon of Saturn that was discovered by Giovanni Domenico Cassini in 1684. Tethys is named after the titan Tethys of Greek mythology. It is also designated Saturn III or S II Tethys.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tethys_%28moon%29

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(1982) STS-3 Columbia Launch - Office of Space Science-1 (OSS-1)

STS-3 was the third space shuttle mission, and was the third mission for the Space Shuttle Columbia. It was the first launch with an unpainted external tank.

STS-3 was the only shuttle mission to land at White Sands Missile Range. The landing demonstrated that the Shuttle could land in the desert, but sand damaged the orbiter.

This was the last mission for which NASA named a backup crew.

Link - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/STS-3

Description:

(1996) STS-76 Atlantis Launch - Third Shuttle-Mir docking; SPACEHAB

It was the 76th shuttle mission, and the 16th flight for Atlantis. It was the 3rd mission to dock with the Mir space station.

Transfer of veteran astronaut Shannon Lucid to Mir to become first American woman to live on station.

Link - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/STS-76

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(1965) Gemini 3 - Grissom, Young

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(1912) Dr. Wernher Magnus Maximilian von Braun (March 23, 1912 – June 16, 1977) was one of the leading figures in the development of rocket technology in Nazi Germany and the United States.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wernher_von_Braun

Time:

7:00am

Description:

First Quarter Moon

Time:

7:01am

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Half Moon (waxing)

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(1961) Mercury Redstone booster qualification flight (MR-BD)

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(1992) STS-45 Atlantis Launch - Atmospheric Laboratory for Applications and Science (ATLAS-1)


Mission highlights
Launch: March 24, 1992, 8:13 a.m. EST.

Carried first Atmospheric Laboratory for Applications and Science (ATLAS-1) on Spacelab pallets mounted in orbiter's cargo bay. The non-deployable payload, equipped with l2 instruments from the United States, France, Germany, Belgium, Switzerland, The Netherlands and Japan, conducted studies in atmospheric chemistry, solar radiation, space plasma physics and ultraviolet astronomy.
Landing: April 2, 1992, 6:23 a.m. EST, Runway 33, Kennedy Space Center.

Link - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/STS-45

Description:

Wilhelm Heinrich Walter Baade
24 March 1893 - 25 June 1960

Born in Germany and educated at Göttingen, Walter Baade worked at the Hamburg Observatory from 1919 to 1931 and at Mt. Wilson from 1931 to 1958. He and Fritz Zwicky proposed in 1934 that supernovae could produce cosmic rays and neutron stars, and Baade made extensive studies of the Crab Nebula and its central star.

http://www.phys-astro.sonoma.edu/BruceMedalists/Baade/index.html

Description:

(1655) Titan was discovered on March 25, 1655 by the Dutch astronomer Christiaan Huygens, and was the first moon in the Solar System to be discovered after the Galilean moons of Jupiter.

Titan or Saturn VI is the largest moon of Saturn and the second largest moon in the solar system, after Jupiter's moon Ganymede. It is roughly 50% larger than Earth's moon by diameter, and is larger by diameter and mass than all known dwarf planets. It is also larger by diameter than the planet Mercury, though Mercury is more than twice as massive.

Titan is the only moon in our solar system to have a dense atmosphere.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Titan_%28moon%29

Description:

(1972) Launch of Soviet Lander / Orbiter Mission to Venus.

Venera 8 was a Venus atmospheric probe and lander. Its instrumentation included temperature, pressure, and light sensors as well as an altimeter, gamma ray spectrometer, gas analyzer, and radio transmitters.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Venera_8

Provided by: AstroScan Media