benzman

I don't care for it when Our Heroes find a new planet, land next to its one and only settlement and find it inhabited by about a dozen people.

When I was boating we were taught that an approaching boat was on a collision course if it was not moving against the background. This works if the boat is against a land horizon but not so well with a sea horizon. Then you fall back on the constant bearing idea. Aircraft are so much quicker that boating rules do not apply so much.

They are also called fondly called 'The Gravel Truck' by the RAAF.

I did a lot of gliding in the 1980s. My best altitude was 14,600 feet. The current glider altitude record is 50,727 feet. Would I be prepared to put on a space suit, get into SolarStratos and go to 75,000 feet or so? In a heartbeat.

Brilliant site and great idea! I watched it all in real time last year and will do the same this year, with time off for sleeping. Reminds me of hearing it all at the time. Was it all really that long ago? Doesn't time fly.

I think it is a pity that discussion on religion is discouraged. Religion is a fascinating subject but discussing it is usually banned because it tends to degenerate into abuse and name-calling. If you look at the world today and see all the death, misery and destruction that is being caused by religion, then the 'respect' given to it has become an irrelevant anachronism. I feel that there is a definite place for an intelligent, reasoned and civilised discussion about religion.

Realising the problems with propellers at high speeds and high altitudes is precisely why people developed jet engines.

Time is what stops everything from happening all at once.

It is an oblate spheroid that is a little uneven and bumpy. How's THAT for scientific accuracy!

That was brilliant!

Going int the Toy and Model Museum in Paddington, London and seeing things in glass cases that I had given to me as Christmas presents so very long ago!

This interested layman finds this quote to be the best I have heard that explains something I have noticed in the past . A tendency, especially among particle physicists, to say "That fits what we see, so it must be right." Planet Vulcan? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vulcan_(hypothetical_planet) Cold fusion? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cold_fusion The Aether? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aether_(classical_element)

Modern astronomers use an electronic version of the blink comparator used by Clyde Tombaugh. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blink_comparator

For a moment there, i actually thought you had written 'teleporting'! I must stop watching Star Trek.

Further to my previous post about The Last Starfighter. It is just about the best teenage boy's wish fulfillment movie ever. It doesn't take itself too seriously and is quite funny in parts. It has great music and the best final scene. As an aside, it was the first film to use CGI instead of models and miniatures. A couple of previous films had used CGI, notably Tron, but they had used CGI to simulate computer graphics! The whole film is on youtube. Search for 'the last starfighter full movie' with no quotes and it will be the first on the list.

I was born in 1943, so I have seen all of the space program from Sputnik onward. There are SOME advantages to being old, but I can't think of many!

The Last Starfighter A film that doesn't take itself too seriously and has the coolest final scene.

I may be a bit off topic but as I recall the hole in the center of a round parachute is to prevent it from oscillating, which makes the parachute spill air from alternate sides, which increases the osculation. I believe that at least one of the early experimenters had a hair-raising ride to earth for this reason. Also, the way KSP clips multiple chutes is just an example of how KSP is not always as realistic as we would like.

I am actually old enough to have been living in England in the early fifties and watched a TV program on a twelve inch black and white TV that first exposed the Piltdown man hoax on the BBC. As far as I know, the only interest in the subject since then has been trying to pin down exactly Who Dunnit!

Riding Rockets by Mike Mullane. A well written, technically interesting and often hilariously funny look at what it was really like to be a NASA astronaut in the shuttle era. At The Edge Of Space by Milton Thompson. Not strictly a space book, but a rattling good read about the X-15 project. Lots of great anecdotes and plenty of technical information. Eight X-15 pilots flew high enough to qualify as astronauts. Joe Engle and Neil Armstrong flew the X-15. Joe Engle went went on to fly the shuttle. We all know what happened to Neil.

I normally only watch about two movies a year, but I will make sure I watch this one!

I just downloaded the picture of the moonship in the original posting, because I thought it was such a beautiful picture, then I saw the word 'bonestell' in the title and it all became clear.

Mr Raging Sandwich (or may I just call you Rage?), I think you have found yourself a permanent job!

At the USAF museum at Dayton there is an Apollo space suit with the back removed so you can stand inside it and get your photo taken!

Despite the small sample size of the Apollo group, that makes for very sobering reading.