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Aerospace Education
External
 NASA
Says First Lunar Eclipse of 2003 will be Fantastic!
This week, millions of sky
watchers can step outside and see the first lunar eclipse of 2003. On May
15th and 16th the moon will glide through Earth's shadow for the first
time this year. The eclipse begins at 10:00 p.m. EDT (7:00 p.m. PDT) on
Thursday evening, May 15th, or 0200 Universal Time (UT) on Friday morning,
May 16th.At first the moon will seem pale and bright, as usual. During
the hour that follows, however, it will plunge into the darkest part of
our planet's shadow--a region that astronomers call "the umbra." On May
15th the moon will be inside the umbra for about 52 minutes, from 11:14
p.m. to 12:06 a.m. EDT (8:14 to 9:06 p.m. PDT) or 0314 to 0406 UT on May
16th.How dark and red the moon appears during that interval depends on
what's floating in Earth's atmosphere. Dust storms and volcanic eruptions
can fill the air with particles that redden sunsets and eclipsed moons
alike. Sometimes the moon is so dark it's nearly invisible. Other times
it's a lovely shade of bright copper.For a brief lesson on the phenomena
of lunar eclipses, visit the Lunar
Eclipses for Beginners home page. For more information about Thursday’s
total lunar eclipse, visit NASA's
Eclipse Home Page. |
 Live
Astronaut Roundtable Webcast
The NASA Glenn Research
Center's Office of Educational Programs and the International Science and
Engineering Fair invites teachers and students to join some of the world’s
most prestigious space explorers as they examine the past, present, and
future of space travel on May 15, from 3:00pm EST to 5:00pm EST as we broadcast
live from the 2003 International Science and Engineering Fair in Cleveland,
Ohio.This rare gathering of famed astronauts includes names associated
with some of the most noted achievements in space exploration history.
Participating in the roundtable discussion will be Guy Bluford (the first
African-American in space), Jack Schmitt (one of the last men to walk on
the moon), Kathy Sullivan (the first American woman to perform a spacewalk),
and the world record holder for cumulative time spent in space, former
Russian cosmonaut Sergei Avdeyev. Also participating in the discussion
will be current NASA astronauts Don Thomas and Nancy Currie.Students will
be given the unique opportunity to email their questions to this distinguished
panel and hear first hand about the exploration of space from some of the
few who have been there.For more information about the webcast, please
click on the link below
www.grc.nasa.gov/WWW/OEP/astro |
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