Don’t Get Your Hopes Up
News that asteroid “2018 VP1“, will pass within about 480 kms of Earth on November 2, 2020, has raised social media hopes that it might be drawn in by the…
Astronomy
Oumuamua: just a piece of rock
If you can watch the whole bit of this piece of New Age woo hoo without flinching or giving up, you will likely shake your head at the utter, mindless…
Thinking about my dad on the 100th anniversary of his birth and Canada’s need for public post-secondary education
PHOTOS: My dad, John L. Climenhaga, as a University of Saskatchewan undergraduate. Below: My father, in the foreground, circa 1917, about the time the asteroid now named Climenhaga in his…
What KIC 8462852 Says About Us
KIC 8462852. Hardly a household name. But it may be, one day soon, or at least when it garners a more prosaic name. It’s a star and it sits rather…
Chasing storms on Saturn
There’s a beautiful video about the Cassini mission and its images of the storms on Saturn at the New York Times website. It’s amazing to see what images and information…
Doomsday averted (again)
Seventeen thousand miles. Seems like a long way, but it’s less than one tenth the distance from here to the moon, and it’s within the satellite belt. In cosmic terms,…
CONJUNCTION
GREAT CONJUNCTION: A great conjunction in the east south east sky tonight. Perfect visibility here in Winnipeg with Jupiter slightly to the left and above the waxing Moon. Gotta get…
1812 and All That: the Bicentenary of Dr. Charles Smallwood, Canadian Scientist (1812 – 1873)
Charles Smallwood 1872.jpg This is a guest post by Andrew McLaren With all the present glorification of the 1812-15 conflict being promoted by Canada’s Federal Government, another important bicentennial is…
Science Brings Rare Planetary Event To Our Living Rooms
For those of you who, like me, didn’t have a pair of eyeball-protecting goggles to watch as the planet Venus crossed the face of the sun this past Tuesday, here’s…