Happy Birthday, Don Pettit

The aurora has a special message for you.

That aurora's got great penmanship

I wonder if you baked a birthday cake in space, would it fall?  And if it did, which way?   These are important scientific questions.  Get on it, astronauts!

(If you are tuning in late, go read this fascinating blog.  You’ll never come back.  You’ll start downloading cool space images and forget all about me.  And that will make me sad.  But it’s all about the advancement of science.)

 

Flying into the aurora

Now this is a job I wouldn’t mind having.

The kind of effects I struggle to capture in paint on canvas are conjured up by magnetized particles with the greatest of ease.

We look at space and feel small.  And it’s good for us.

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Via @openculture and @youtube