First Super Moon of 2018

The new year 2019 started with a big super moon as a goodwill sign from the Nature. While the New Year's celebrations painted the skies around the world with multi coloured fire works and their bursting and cracking sounds, Nature preserved this surprise for the world a day later on the first day of the year.

While there will be many full moons later this year, as per NASA, this was the "biggest and brightest" one for the entire year.

As an avid lover of sunsets and moons, I was there to catch the last setting sun of the year which slowly went down taking along itself many tragedies and happy moments from across the universe. and I am sure all sky gazers and astronomy lovers would have been there on their rooftops or among the Nature itself somewhere in a desolate place, a lake side or a hill top or even the window of their houses watching end and begging of the two years.

This year will have many moon sightings, the one at the at of this month on 31 January when we will get a chance to see first Blue Moon of the year. For the information of those not having any idea of what super moon is, here it is how it happens: The phenomenon "super moon" occurs when the moon becomes full on the same day it reaches its perigee, the point in the moon's elliptical orbit when it is closest to Earth.

As for the Blue Moon, the simple definition is that it is a type of Full Moon - looking blue. It is caused by a rare type of dust in the atmosphere. However, sometimes Blue Moon may look red, because it will cause a total lunar eclipse, also known as a Blood Moon. So stay tuned and be ready to witness the first Blue Moon of the year on 31 January 2018.

Photos by me !!
If you like Hobby Shobbys, then please follow us on Facebook
Follow @HobbyShobbys

Read More

Get Ready for the Greatest Meteors Show of your Lifetime

Sky gazers are incredible people for they see something incredible and magnificent while the majority of the world sleeps. Sky gazers see stars falling, galaxies moving and meteors showering across the sky and witness the wondrous world of the Nature.

Well jus about two weeks from now, there is going to be an incredible meteor shower night - 12th August to be exact and sky gazers a round the world are notified not to miss the night - for it may be one the most beautiful nights of their lives. According to the astronomers, this will be the brightest and most lit night in the recorded human history. The sky will be so bright that the light could even be visible during the day.

As per Ski-Tech Univers, "This meteor shower is being considered as once in a lifetime opportunity as the next meteor shower of such kind will be after 96 years."

So be there on your roof top or camp at night on a hilltop away from the lights of the city to really enjoy thios greatest show on the sky of your life.

Source/Photo

If you like Hobby Shobbys, then please follow us on Facebook and Twitter

Read More

Halley’s comet to shower its flashy lights this Wednesday-Thursday

Here comes the day the sky watchers and sky gazers await eagerly: The Halley’s comet with all its flashes and one of the world’s most incredible meteor showers.

People in the Southern Hemisphere will have the best of the show while those in the Northern Hemisphere may get a lesser show in the early mornings. However for all, the best time to see the shower is between 3 am and 5 am your local time.

Tips on how to view the best of the show: NASA suggests finding an area well away from city or street lights, prepared with a sleeping bag, blanket or chair to view the Eta Aquarids,.

Read details at Daily Mail

If you like Hobby Shobbys, then please follow us on Facebook and Twitter

Read More

World watches Full Red Supermoon eclipse on 28 September while Pakistan will witness Penumbral lunar eclipse

On 28th September, most of the world would witness a full moon bathed in red as total lunar will occur - or what is called the Supermoon. It will be visible in North and South America, Africa and western Asia.

The eclipse will last 1 hour and 11 minutes and begins at 8:11pm ET (1.11am BST) and will also be seen in eastern Pacific Ocean region and Europe.

However, in Pakistan the total eclipse will not be visible - rather it will be the Penumbral Lunar Eclipse. A penumbral lunar eclipse takes place when the Moon moves through the faint, outer part of the Earth's shadow. This type of eclipse is often mistaken for a normal full Moon.

The penumbral lunar eclipse will start to set in at 5:11:47 on 28 September at 265degreess from the North and will have its full eclipse around 5:44:30 at 270 degrees - just about 11 minutes before the moonset.

By full Penumbral eclipse we mean almost half of the moon having a slight shadow before its sets - while the eclipse will continue below the horizon and attain actual Penumbral eclipse by eight in the morning.

Watch a video of the process at: Time and Data

Full Moon Photo: Taken by me and shared at Flickr - Jalalspages

If you like Hobby Shobbys, then please follow us on Facebook and Twitter

Read More

First ever hi-definition image of Pluto show huge mountains made of water ice

Good news for sky gazers and hobbyists who love astronomy - Image of Pluto with 10 times the resolution of anything ever seen before has been unveiled by NASA reveal huge 11,000 feet high  mountains mad of water ice.

NASA's New Horizons, that made its closest approach to Pluto on 14th July after 3 billion-mile journey that took 9.5 years, has sent back these amazing HD images of the distant planet Pluto.

The remarkable image, released alongside new pictures of Pluto's moons Charon and Hydra, provides evidence that geological activity is still taking place on the icy world.

Pluto (right) and its moon Charon (left)

Scientists were awe-stricken to see these huge mountains mountains as high as those in the Rockies that likely formed 100 million years ago - mere youngsters relative to the 4.56-billion-year age of the solar system.

NASA says they may still be in the process of building.

Watch the video below:

Source
Photo | Video: NASA
If you like Hobby Shobbys, then please follow us on Facebook and Twitter

Read More

Pluto captured in colour for the first time

Good news for the astronomers, sky gazers and hobbyists trying to probe the starry universe above. The New Horizons probe has captured its first image of Pluto - the distant dwarf planet.

The rather blurry and hazy picture which has been released by the US space agency NASA shows a reddish Pluto along with its biggest moon Charon.

It may be added that New Horizons is set to barrel past Pluto on 14th July this year. This significant event  will complete the reconnaissance of the "classical nine" planets of our Solar System.

Source
If you like Hobby Shobbys, then please follow us on Facebook and Twitter

Read More

The universe - the fathomless frontiers beyond

Astronomy and sky gazing are hobbies that a large number of people adopt or love to adopt. Looking up to the sky in a dark night gives us a sky-scape consisting of trillions of tiny stars shinning above us. Almost all stars, even the nearest which we call our sun, are so far away away that one cannot never think of reaching out to them. The next star to the sun is 110 light years away - imagine the distance.

But while the powerful and the Almighty God created this unfathomable universe, He gave us knowledge - knowledge of science and astronomy to just have a 'feel' of his mighty empire He alone has the control over it. And the beauty is that the entire universe is moving in a set time frame so precisely calculated that no star and its planets get out of the respective orbits. And if that happens, the entire universe would collapse - perhaps that would be the Armageddon - or the doomsday.

The mention of the vastness of the universe and its timed movement appears in holy scriptures and books. God says in Quran: ''And He (is) The One Who created the night and the daytime, and the sun and the moon, each swimming in an orbit.''.......also God says : '' It does not behoove the sun to overtake the moon, nor does the night outstrip the daytime, and each is swimming in an orbit.'

I just came across a video on Facebook, prepared by the American Museum of Natural History, which shows the incredible God has created around us. When I saw the video, I just thought how very small or in fact tiny we are as compared to what else exists around us.

Watch the video - seeing is believing

THIS VIDEO WILL BLOW YOUR MIND
►►►More cool stuff like this on our Radio Blog. You can also listen to our NEW "Graffiti Kings Radio" live & online NOW ►►► www.graffitikings.co.uk/radio/Like ✔ Share ✔ Comment ✔ Tag ✔ spread the love.
Posted by Graffiti Kings on Thursday, July 24, 2014

This is only the part of the universe known to the man today - may be tomorrow and and the day afters man knows much more than he knows today - may be he finds people living out there we portray as aliens in our movies these days.

If you like Hobby Shobbys, then please follow us on Facebook and Twitter

Read More

The Seasons of Saturn - NASA Picture of the Day

Image Credit: R. G. French (Wellesley College) et al., NASA, ESA, and The Hubble Heritage Team (STScI/AURA)

Since Saturn's axis is tilted as it orbits the Sun, Saturn has seasons, like those of planet Earth ... but Saturn's seasons last for over seven years. So what season is it on Saturn now? Orbiting the equator, the tilt of the rings of Saturn provides quite a graphic seasonal display. Each year until 2016, Saturn's rings will be increasingly apparent after appearing nearly edge-on in 2009. The ringed planet is also well placed in evening skies providing a grand view as summer comes to Saturn's northern hemisphere and winter to the south. 

The Hubble Space Telescope took the above sequence of images about a year apart, starting on the left in 1996 and ending on the right in 2000. Although they look solid, Saturn's Rings are likely less than 50 meters thick and consist of individually orbiting bits of ice and rock ranging in size from grains of sand to barn-sized boulders.

via Astronomy Picture of the Day NASA

If you like hobby Shobbys, then please follow us on Facebook and Twitter

Read More

Explosion on moon visible from earth

I do not know whether the hobbying astronomers watched this or not, but NASA did notice a bright explosion on moon which was visible from the earth.

Explosion on the moon, reported by NASA May 17, was caused by a meteor hitting the surface and was visible on earth to the naked eye

The explosion was caused by a meteoroid that struck the moon surface recently, says NASA on Friday. The impact caused an explosion that was visible on Earth without the aid of a telescope. But don't be alarmed if you didn't see it; it only lasted about a second.

"It exploded in a flash nearly 10 times as bright as anything we've ever seen before," said Bill Cooke, of NASA's Meteoroid Environment Office.

NASA's lunar monitoring program has detected hundreds of meteoroid impacts. The brightest, detected on March 17, 2013, in Mare Imbrium, is marked by the red square

NASA says the meteoroid was about 40 kilograms and less than a meter wide, and it hit the moon's surface at 56,000 mph. It glowed like a 4th magnitude star, NASA says, thanks to an explosion equivalent to 5 tons of TNT.

However there is one question which may or may not have come to your mind. But if you're wondering how there can be an explosion on the moon, without oxygen, NASA has the answer for you. It says the flash of light comes not from any type of combustion - as we typically think of explosions - but rather by the glowing molten rock at the impact site.

So this is the answer which may add to your knowledge if you are a hobbying astronomer. So keep watch moon more  - you may find another explosion too if you are lucky.

(via CNN - NASA )
If you like hobby Shobbys, then please follow us on Facebook and Twitter

Read More

Asteroid 2012 DA14 to intrude inside earth's communication satellite orbit - next day of Valentine Day

Breaking news for those whose hobby is astronomy and sky gazing!!

While the world be celebrating the Valentine Day, astronomers and sciencetists would be busy tracking asteroid 2012 DA14 which is to whiz past earth at a distance of 17,200 miles on 15th February- something which is a near miss in space terms.

It may be added that the communication satellites launched from earth orbit at a distance of 22,200 miles above earth - meaning by that the asteroid 2012 DA14 will have an ingress of some 5,000 miles from the communication satellite's orbital range.

Although the asteroid is small, if it were on a collision course with Earth, it would produce the equivalent of 2.5 megatons of TNT and could wipe out a city the size of Greater London.

The best view for astronomers will be from Indonesia, says NASA, while stargazers in Eastern Europe, Asia and Australia should also be able to get a good look at the space rock as it whizzes past us at a speed of 17,400mph.

The asteroid's next very close shave with Earth will be in 2046, when it will squeak by us at a distance of 37,000 miles.

Via Mail Online
Follow @HobbyShobbys

Read More

Mysterious object found zipping over the moon

While NASA may have better explanation for this, but a recently uploaded armature  astronomer's video shows a mysterious object zipping over the surface of the moon.

Mysterious Object marked in red circle 

Scroll down for video

The user, danchek2013, has uploaded a video that shows a moving object emerging from the shadowy landscape of the moon's surface and then seemingly accelerating over the craters, before changing direction at breakneck speed and heading towards the bottom of the screen.

Intriguingly, it appears to leave vapour trails, similar to a plane, in its wake.

-->

User 'King Dennis Jensen' said: 'At first I was like "meh another satellite" and then one more showed up faster than the other and it did all those swift angle movements.. Quite interesting indeed.'
Nathan5638 simply said: 'That's legit people!'

Well what it is - no one for now is very sure to answer. Maybe some clue is found by experienced astronomers or for that matter NASA.

Watch the video below and see the mysterious object zipping over the moon surface:

via Mail Online
Follow @HobbyShobbys

Read More

Mysterious zombie planet found orbiting the 'Eye of Sauron'

'Breaking News' for Atronomy lovers!!

Astronomers have found a mysterious 'zombie' planet circling a vast debris disc inside the 'Eye of Sauron' star system, reports Mail Online quoting NASA.

Chronological movement of the zombie planet Fomalhaut as tracked by NASA [Photo: NASA]

The newly released NASA Hubble Space Telescope images of the eye shaped star, officially called Fomalhaut, and a mysterious planet, called Fomalhaut b, may provide forensic evidence of a titanic planetary disruption in the system.

The planet, called Fomalhaut b, swings as close to its star as 4.6 billion miles, and the outermost point of its orbit is 27 billion miles away from the star.

-->

Astronomers were surprised to find the debris belt is wider than previously known, spanning a section of space from 14 to nearly 20 billion miles from the star.

Watch video of the chronoligcal move of the zombie planet:

via Mail Online
Follow @HobbyShobbys

Read More

Black holes weighing 40 billion suns discovered

How big is the universe  - one would never know. But recently scientists have discovered black holes weighing 40 billion suns - and mind you these are just one set of God knows how many black holes 'out there.'

This NASA image shows a new image of a ring - not of jewels - but of black holes. This composite image of Arp 147, a pair of interacting galaxies located about 430 million light years from Earth, shows X-rays from the NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory (pink) and optical data from the Hubble Space Telescope (red, green, blue) produced by the Space Telescope Science Institute, or STSc (AFP Photo / NASA)

However, the present discovery is the largest ever black holes discovered so far. These giants, all located in far-off galaxies about 1.3 billion light years from Earth, are more common than scientists originally thought.

Scientists refer to them as ‘ultramassive’ black holes, not to confuse them with ‘supermassive’ holes, with only a few confirmed examples.

A survey, conducted by author Julie Hlavacek-Larrondo of Stanford University and her team, showed that at least ten out of 18 galaxies they studied had black holes that may weigh up to 40 billion times the mass of the sun.

-->

"Ultramassive black holes – that is, black holes with masses exceeding 10 billion solar masses – are probably not rare; several and even dozens of these colossal black holes may exist," said Julie Hlavacek-Larrondo, the study's lead author.

To estimate the size of these ultramassive holes, Hlavacek-Larrondo and her colleagues analyzed the X-rays and radio waves generated by black holes when they destroy the gas, dust, and stars near them. The black holes they found turned out to be roughly 10 times larger than expected, given the size of their respective host galaxies.

Read more about the discovery of these black holes at RT

Follow @HobbyShobbys

Read More

Horse-head shaped Nebula

Follow @HobbyShobbys

Horse-head shaped Nebula

Credit & Copyright: Nigel Sharp (NOAO), KPNO, AURA, NSF

Don't you think it really looks like a horse head? Well to me it does - what an amazing creation of the Nature.

Horse-head Nebula  is one of the most identifiable nebulae in the sky, the Horsehead Nebula in Orion, is part of a large, dark, molecular cloud. Also known as Barnard 33, the unusual shape was first discovered on a photographic plate in the late 1800s. The red glow originates from hydrogen gas predominantly behind the nebula, ionized by the nearby bright star Sigma Orionis. 

The darkness of the Horsehead is caused mostly by thick dust, although the lower part of the Horsehead's neck casts a shadow to the left. Streams of gas leaving the nebula are funneled by a strong magnetic field. Bright spots in the Horsehead Nebula's base are young stars just in the process of forming. Light takes about 1,500 years to reach us from the Horsehead Nebula. The above image was taken with the 0.9-meter telescope at Kitt Peak National Observatory.

Shared via NASA Astronomy Picture of the Day (21 October 2012)

Read More

Planet with four suns discovered by astronomers

It has been a while that I wrote something about astronomy for the astronomy lovers. But today I have a news for the sky gazers both naked eye and telescopes. But the discovery I am going to talk about is far beyond normal telescopes.

I came across this news in the Business Recorder, which quoting AFP says that an international team of amateur and professional astronomers has discovered a planet whose skies are lit up by four suns -- the first known case of such a phenomenon.

The planet, located about 5,000 light years from Earth, has been dubbed PH1 in honor of Planet Hunters, a programme led by Yale University in the United States, which enlists volunteers to look for signs of new planets.

PH1 is orbiting two suns, and in turn is orbited by a second distant pair of stars. Only six planets are known to orbit two stars, researchers say, and none of those are orbited by other distant stars.

Interesting, isn't it?

Read more about it at the Business Recorder

Read More

The last Venus Transit of the Century

6th June was a rare day of the century and all astronomers and astronomy lovers as the planet Venus transited between the earth and the sun for the last time of the present century. Almost everyone who has some love for astronomy was there watching for the rare phenomenon on Wednesday to preserve the moment as that was last time they saw it in their life times as the next transit would occur after 105 years.

I was up too, but due to clouds I could not see rare Venus transit of my lifetime. However, I am sharing one shot as shared from the TIME magazine:

The above photo was taken in New Delhi and Venus can be clearly seen as a black dot on the top left corner of the sun [Photo Courtesy: TIME]

TIME magazine has also shared a number of other photos of the Venus transit and arranged these in a slide show which can be seen here

Read More

Milky Way Destined for Head-On Collision

News for astronomy lovers and hobbyists!! Our Milky Way is Destined for Head-On Collision

The U.S. space agency, NASA, says our galaxy, the Milky Way, and the neighboring Andromeda galaxy will crash into each other in 4 billion years in a head-on collision.

NASA scientists say the new findings end nearly 100 years of speculation about whether Andromeda would directly plow into our galaxy, or merely deliver a glancing blow as it continued moving through the cosmos.  

The study co-authors say the Earth and the other seven planets in the solar system likely will not be destroyed in the titanic pile-up, but the Sun - just like many other stars - will be flung into a different part of the galaxy. In all likelihood, the Sun will complete its stellar life-cycle in an area even farther away from the galactic core than it is now.

The NASA scientists say their findings indicate that Andromeda and the Milky Way will take about 2 billion years to completely merge into a single elliptical-shaped galaxy.

Read details: VOA

Read More

NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory looks at sun differently

Nasa's Solar Dynamics Observatory is an 'eye' in space focused on the sun - but its scientists have found an all-new way of looking at the star that gives our planet heat and life.

Nasa's Solar Dynamics Observatory is an 'eye' in space focused on the sun - but its scientists have found an all-new way of looking at the star that gives our planet heat and life

Don't be deceived by the calming blues and browns - the boiling surface of the star is around 600,000 degrees centigrade, just viewed through a wavelength that highlights the constant activity.

'There's no science behind it,' says Scott Wiesinger of Goddard Space Flight Centre, 'But it looks very pretty.'

Read more / watch Video: Mail Online

Read More

Solar Tornado That's Five Times Wider Than Earth [Video]

The armature astronomers may not have noticed this phenomenon with their not too much powerful astronomical gadgets, but a group of astronomers at a Welsh University have filmed a solar tornado on the face of the sun which is said to be five times as wide as the Earth.

Scientists Xing Li and Huw Morgan recorded the event by placing a telescope on board the Solar Discovery Observatory satellite. They hope that the recording of this event and others will help them to understand weather in space and the causes of the space storms which can cause damage to satellites in space, The Telegraph reports.

Watch the video below:

Source: Business Insider / YouTube 

Read More

Closest pairing of Venus and Jupiter coming up

Good news for the astronomers and astronomy lovers !!

Pairing of Venus and Jupiter [ Photo: 2012 Sky and Telescope ]

You may be able to see Jupiter and Venus in the sky very close to each other and  reach to their  closest point in the coming days.

Despite being vastly far from one another in space, the conjunction will make them appear just a few degrees apart in the sky - about the width of a pair of fingers held at arm's length.

The pair can be seen to the west-southwest, shortly after sunset.

Venus is the brighter of the two, and Jupiter will appear to move in a line past it for the rest of the month.

Another anticipated planetary event for 2012 will be the transit of Venus in early June, when it will appear from some locations on Earth to pass in front of the Sun.

Shared from: BBC News

Read More