CRTC & NASA TVAugust 21, 2007
After some googling this week I was very disappointed to read
this article. Apparently the CRTC has refused pleas from both cable providers and individuals to allow the broadcast of NASA TV to Canadian homes, on the technicality that the channel is foreign and would put providers over their limit for the amount of foreign material they are allowed to air.
Update: I filled in a web form on CRTC's website to inquire about this and was impressed with their response time. Within a few days I got a response back that linked to an article from a couple of months ago detailing their decision to allow NASA TV to be broadcast. Yay! Hopefully Rogers and others will get the channel into their lineup this year.
Shuttle Endeavor
August 14, 2007
Last week on the day of the shuttle launch, Meredith and I were driving across town. I wasn't able to watch on TV, so instead we turned on the radio incase CBC was covering the launch. Sure enough, just as we got the station tuned we heard "3 2 1..." followed by the ignition of the engines. It's uncanny how these launches bring a tear to my eye. I don't know what it is. But as we sat there and listened to the roar of the launch and heard the announcers describe the shuttle passing all of the critical parts of the ascent, there was a tangeable sense of emotion. This will be the last shuttle flight with a Canadian on board, ever. The shuttle is due to retire in a couple of years.
The following night it was unfortunately cloudy, otherwise I would have been able to see the ISS fly over followed right behind in the sky by the space shuttle that was due to dock the next day at noon.
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International Space StationAugust 5, 2007
This weekend Meredith and I are up in Kincardine at her family cottage, the "Huron Haven". Last night just happened to be one of the prime viewing nights to see the ISS fly over South Western Ontario, and it was almost perfect for the Kincardine area. At 9:30 PM, I went to the
NASA tracking page and watched the station fly over the south Pacific, finally crossing the shores of Mexico and then racing up towards Ontario. At 9:40 PM, an hour after sunset, we headed down to the beach and sat on the picnic table waiting in anticipation. As we sat there waiting, looking to the South West, we wondered "is that it"? After a couple of miscues, Paul finally spotted it coming up over the horizon. Soon it was high up in the sky, a brilliantly bright star. The higher in the sky it got, the brighter and faster it seemed to get, until it was directly overhead, just motoring! Amazing to think that three people are living and working up there. The next shuttle launch is scheduled for two days from now (Tuesday).
Another interesting thing I'd like to check out is called an "Iridium Flare". The Iridium sattelites, when they make a perfect angle between an observer on the ground and the sun, attain a brightness factor of -8, which is many times brighter than Venus, -4 at its brightest, and compared to -2.4 for the ISS last night.
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