Look Up: What's in the Sky This Week?
We hope you didn't miss Look Up too much while your Space Editor was up to other things during the past month. Your weekly astronomy fix is back, however, so pull up a lawn chair and dim the porch light.
Actually, our first event comes with its own chairs. Hubble 3D opens at IMAX theaters this Friday, March 19. A private world premiere event was held at the Smithsonian National Air & Space Museum last Tuesday, with a screening featuring special guests, including Lori Garver, Deputy Administrator of NASA, and most of the STS-125 crew that stars in the film.
Let's not mince words: this movie is mindblowing. Hubble 3D not only takes you on a ride with the three main astronaut crews responsible for getting the Hubble Space Telescope up and running (in 1990, 1992, and 2009), but it actually takes you through space to the galaxy fields and nebulae we can see through Hubble's eye. The telescope's ability to resolve fine detail from millions of light-years away has allowed scientists (and probably a lot of graphic designers) to create fantastic 3D images -- a flight through space to the Orion Nebula, with its nursery of baby stars nestled inside, bursting away interstellar material as they grow, is something out of Carl Sagan's dreams.
This is no lame-ass "reality-based" James Cameron 3D, this is full-on Captain EO style, duck-or-reach-out-and-touch-it 3D -- and let's face it, that's what we really want to see when we put on those stupid-looking glasses. If you've never seen a space shuttle launch (or even if you have), Hubble 3D might be one of the best, closest experiences you'll ever have. Multiple cameras from the tower and surrounding launchpad capture the full ground-shaking experience of the launch as the exhaust and steam blow right over you and the roar explodes from the speakers.
On a personal note: the launch they filmed was actually the first launch I saw in person, in May 2009 -- you'll see clips from the bleachers at Banana Creek where I was sitting -- and while nothing can beat the grandeur of that memory, I have to admit, this experience came an almost infinitesimally close second.
Hubble 3D isn't just a movie for space fans, though all of you should buy your tickets immediately. The film might be the best convert opportunity you'll ever have. Your friend who doesn't really "get" why you like all this space stuff, your kids to whom you're trying to teach the wonders of the universe and instill the curiosity that creates future scientists, engineers and explorers -- take them to this movie and let the NASA filmmakers do the work for you.
Hubble 3D opens this Friday at the Air & Space Museum on the Mall and runs about 45 minutes. Tickets and showtimes here.
>> Popular astrophysicist (yup, I just said that) Neil deGrasse Tyson was in town last Thursday to talk and answer questions at the GW Lisner Auditorium for a WETA sponsored "Cosmic Conversation." WETA will have the video online by Monday -- it's a chance to witness how effective a true science communicator can be. Update: WETA has the lecture up now in Part 1 and Part 2.
>> Heads up: a launch scheduled at Wallops Flight Facility last Thursday got scrubbed because of the weather and will be rescheduled sometime on or after March 22. Keep an eye on their website and Twitter, and maybe head down there to watch it yourself. Revisit our post about Wallops and MARS from earlier this year for a refresher.
>> Next Saturday is the vernal equinox. Say hellooooooooo to warmer weather.
>> A couple comets found out last Friday what happens when the Sun's gravity decides that you may not pass Go.