50,000 years ago, a cosmologic eye-blink, the Earth gained 300,000 tons of nickel-iron mass in about ten seconds. Meteor Crater Natural Landmark is a cool stop along I-40 in northern Arizona.
Pair this with my Video clip 05: Luck
Meteor crater
Mercury viewing
Opportunities to see Mercury are rare. Right now, it is reaching its greatest elongation and is in an optimal position for viewing shortly after sunset.
earthsky.org
Hopping on an asteroid
Japan’s Hayabusa2 probe is currently in orbit around the asteroid Ryugu. It has successfully deployed two rovers, MINERVA-II1a and MINERVA-II1b, designed to literally hop around on the surface of the asteroid. The pics sent back so far are rather trippy. In particular, check out the video of the sun moving across the asteroid’s sky.
Sample return
“But why go to all this trouble?”
Didn’t Mallory already answer questions like this back in 1923?
Why is Mars small?
Here’s an article on the formation of the Solar System and why Mars is smaller than expected.
It’s interesting that Mars is small. It’s interesting to think about the formation of the Solar System. But what I find particularly compelling is the description of three distinct hypotheses, each just as likely to be correct as the others.
