CAS Update - 6th January 2008

Happy New Year to all CAS News readers. I said I would try and provide more regular updates this year by way of a weekly news round-up. So here's the first 'issue'.

I'll try and break down each update into three sections; space and astronomy news, observing news and society news. So here goes . . .

Space and Astronomy News

Spirit celebrates 4th anniversary: NASA's Spirit rover has just celebrated 4 years on Mars. This is a major achievement and is of course celebrated by Stuart in Cumbrian Sky and on Chris Lintott's blog.

Slim chance of meteor impact on Mars: There's a lot of excitement on the web about the possibility, estimated at about 1in 25, that a large meteor will impact Mars on 30th January.

Shuttle Launch delayed: The next shuttle mission (Atlantis) was due to launch before Christmas but has been delayed a number of times due to problems with a fuel sensor. Universe Today has the story.

Latest Cassini Image: The Cassini team have given us an early new year's present with this fantastic image of Saturn's moon Mimas as seen through the F ring.


Descriptions of the background to the image at Tom's Astronomy Blog and Emily Lakdawala's Planetary Society Blog.

Observing

Look out for Comet 8P/Tuttle this week. Not as bright as the recent comet Holmes but still worth trying to track down in Cetus. Finder chart here.

Society News

Our next meeting is on 29th January usual time and place. We'll be covering a round up of the latest astronomy news, discussing our plans for 2008 and I'll be giving a talk on Asteroids.