Comet 17P/Holmes

Last week this inconspicuous periodic comet which had been a distantly faint magnitude 17 suddenly flared up, nova-like, to a bright magnitude 2.2, suddenly becoming one of the brightest stars in the constellation Perseus. Situated SE of Mirphak I finally got a decent …

Offshore Survival Course

At the end of this post is an excellent example video of the type of thing I've been doing the last few days. Yes, being submerged in a helicopter and then rolled over to simulate a capsize at sea was all part of my Basic Offshore Survival and Induction and Emergency …

Hunting for Comet LONEOS

Yesterday evening, with the promise of clear skies, I headed out west from my flat and over to Kincorth Nature reserve. The last few people were hurrying home with their dogs and by the time I crested the hill to get my clear western view the reserve was quiet and I was …

MNM: Syme

A certain someone is quite often teasing me about my (some might say unhealthy) interest in Finnish indie music. Well here is something to set the record straight - a Norweigen indie band, ha!

Syme are Ketil Endresen, Fredrik Vogsborg, Ben Nerdal, Eivind Waage, Vidar …

Endeavour Photos

I've just come across this page of absolutely incredible photos from the latest Space Shuttle mission to the International Space Station. I'm not sure how long the page will remain up but check them out if you can - they are beautiful.

Exoplanets at the Aberdeen Astronomical Society

On Tuesday evening I went over to the Cromwell Tower Observatory amongst the old University buildings in Old Aberdeen where the Aberdeen Astronomical Society were holding their first meeting of the winter season. After an introduction from the President, Darren Moody, …

Observing Challenge: Comet 2007 F1 (LONEOS)

Martin Mckenna over on the UKWeatherWorld forum has just posted some information about a new comet which was discovered back in March and is now making its closest approach to the sun, passing perihelion at 0.4 AU on Sunday October 28th. With a predicted magnitude of …

Day 13 - Sunday 22nd July 2007

We awoke to a freezing cold morning where rain in the night had fallen as a dusting of snow on the distant mountains. We put on a few layers of clothing and headed down for breakfast. Because of the sudden drop in temperature our horse trekking had been delayed by about …

They said, there's too much caffeine in your blood stream

During the last couple of days I've been making a concerted effort to move fulltime into the wonderful world of Linux, with the highly popular Ubuntu flavour. This has definitely been my most successful attempt, with wireless networking, blogging and website editing all …

Day 14 - Monday 23rd July 2007

Today was my birthday as well as our free day in Wellington, our first city since Auckland a week before. After a fairly relaxed start to the day, including breakfast made with the one functioning toaster in the kitchen (which still required someone to stand holding the …

Harvest Moon

About an hour ago I went outside and spent fifteen minutes or so battling against fast moving clouds which kept bringing in showers of rain, moving in on cold blasts of northerly air. Still it wasn't a waste of time and I managed to catch a sight and take some images of …

Day 15 - Tuesday 24th July 2006

It was yet another crisp, clear morning as we, bleary eyed and only half awake, clambered aboard a tiny shuttle bus which took us the short way down to the Interislander ferry terminal. We checked in our bags and only had to wait ten minutes or so before we were allowed …

MNM: Siberian

A few years ago now, back when I was working before university, I remember reading Q Magazine one afternoon and coming across a brief review of the debut album by a Liverpool-based band called The Open which convinced me to pick it up. That album, entitled The Silent …

Moon threatens star

This morning observers in the Midlands and the South West of England might have been lucky enough to catch a grazing occultation of the star Regulus (Alpha Leonis) by the Moon. Unfortunately up in Scotland there was no occultation, but as I went outside this morning …