Urban skies: The blaze of Venus (upper left) poses with the thin crescent Moon above downtown Milwaukee, Wisconsin on April 19, 2007. Daniel Pendick I took this photo at about 8 P.M. last Thursday April 19. I live near downtown Milwaukee, at the south...

While most of my friends and colleagues were enjoying beautiful spring weather this past weekend, I was attending the annual meeting of the American Research Center in Egypt (ARCE) in Toledo, Ohio. The weather was beautiful there as well, but I spent...

Last week, I started a series of blogs devoted to helping you construct a home observatory. One of the most important considerations involves choosing a site. Of course, you want the best overall location for your observatory, but is that 50 feet out...

Today I want to share with you a really cool solar system image I came across on my daily cruise of the blogosphere. It's a linear arrangement of 88 known bodies in the solar system with diameters larger than 200 miles (320 kilometers). It was created...

Some observers swear by observing lists. Others swear at them. The latter don't want to bother (or don't have the time) to prepare object lists before their observing sessions. Many observers with go-to drives let the computers in their telescopes...

Where do you want to go when you die? I don't mean in the sense of an afterlife. That's too complicated and contentious — the myriad beliefs range from nowhere to reincarnation to paradise (or somewhere considerably warmer). Where do you...

Skepticism thrives in a climate of uncertainty. Without the definitive proof to establish the facts of a question, anyone can float a hypothesis — however strained and baseless — and simply say, "Prove I'm wrong." Last week,...

The Compton Gamma Ray Observatory appears in the shuttle’s cargo bay shortly before it was deployed April 7, 1991. NASA Sixteen years ago this Saturday, NASA deployed the Compton Gamma Ray Observatory (CGRO). Astronauts aboard the space shuttle...

Last week, I shared some reasons why amateur astronomers create observing lists before heading out to observe. I also gave some tips for those of you who want to prepare such lists. Here are a few more. Keep a list of challenge objects on hand in case...

Dona Ana County, New Mexico, is home to some pretty forward-looking folks. Last week, the county's 200,000 residents passed a local sales-tax increase to support a brand-new industry: space tourism. Sir Richard Branson, head of Virgin Atlantic Airways...

Next Monday, astronaut Sunita Williams will attempt a first-ever feat while many of us are stationed in front of computer screens or TVs — she plans on running the Boston Marathon from the International Space Station (ISS). Williams, has trained...

As I write this, I'm looking out my office window at a raging snowstorm. A week ago, I was reaching for the AC knob in my car on the evening commute. Holy malevolent meteorology! Meteorology's province is the atmosphere, specifically the study...

The first space shuttle flight came April 12, 1981, when the shuttle Columbia roared off the launchpad at Cape Canaveral. NASA "I see Earth. It's so beautiful!" Although these words don't resonate quite the way "That's one small...

If you're just getting interested in amateur astronomy, you may read with dismay statements like, "best seen from a dark site," "get away from city lights," and "galaxies cannot be seen under light-polluted skies." Well...

Now that humans have broken the green barrier — launching fabulously wealthy people into orbit — the Russian aerospace firm RKK Energia has proposed the next advance in commercial spaceflight: exporting toxic waste and other harmful processes...

Setting: a lakeshore in southeastern Wisconsin. Saturday evening. 9 P.M. Dramatis personae: Susie; her husband, Tony; Susie's Mom; Susie's children, Hazel and Hannah; and Saturn, the ringed planet. Equipment: Tele Vue Ranger , a small but mighty...

In a previous blog post , I celebrated Wisconsin as an astronomical center. Forward-thinking politicos in the Dairy State want to create Spaceport Sheboygan — a private spaceport that will launch spacecraft carrying satellites, space-station payloads...

One of the best things I've done in amateur astronomy is to construct a small observatory in the backyard of a former house. It's not that hard to do, and for this and the next six blogs, I'll outline how you can build your own observatory...