Space News Update - December 11, 2018 -

1. Space News Update - December 11, 2018 - • In the News • Story 1: • NASA’s Voyager 2 Probe Enters Interstellar Space • Story 2: • NASA’s Newly Arrived OSIRIS-REx Spacecraft Already Discovers Water on Asteroid • Story 3:Planning the New Horizons Exploration of Ultima Thule • Departments • The Night Sky • ISS Sighting Opportunities • NASA-TV Highlights • Space Calendar • Food for Thought • Space Image of the Week

2. NASA’s Voyager 2 Probe Enters Interstellar Space

3. NASA’s Newly Arrived OSIRIS-REx Spacecraft Already Discovers Water on Asteroid

4. Planning the New Horizons Exploration of Ultima Thule

5. The Night Sky Tuesday, December 11 • Now you'll find Alpha and Beta Capricorni to the right of the Moon at nightfall. • The Summer Triangle is sinking lower in the west, and Altair is the first of its stars to go (for mid-northern observers). Start by spotting bright, zero-magnitude Vega in the northwest right after dark. The brightest star above Vega is Deneb. Altair, the Triangle's third star, is farther to Vega's left or lower left. How late into the night, and into the advancing season, can you keep Altair in view? Wednesday, December 12 • The thick crescent Moon forms a roughly equilateral triangle, 20° or more on a side, with Mars to its upper left and Fomalhaut to its lower left. Thursday, December 13 • The Mars-Moon-Fomalhaut triangle has narrowed since yesterday as the Moon moves eastward along its orbit. • The Geminid meteor shower should be at its peak late tonight! In early evening the meteors will be few, but those that do appear will be Earth-grazers skimming far across the top of the atmosphere. As the hours pass and the shower's radiant (near Castor in Gemini) rises higher in the east, the meteors will become shorter and more numerous — the most so from midnight to dawn. This should be a good year for the Geminids. There’s not too much light from the Moon during the evening, and then the Moon sets around 10 or 11 p.m., leaving the sky dark for the peak hours until dawn. Layer up even more warmly than you imagine you'll need; think radiational cooling! Find a dark open spot with no local lights to get in your eyes, lie back in a reclining lawn chair, and gaze up into the stars. Be patient. As your eyes adapt to the dark, you may see a Geminid every minute or two on average as night grows late. Sky & Telescope

6. ISS Sighting Opportunities ISS For Denver: Sighting information for other cities can be found at NASA’s Satellite Sighting Information

7. MAVEN Launch November 18, 2013 NASA MAVEN Launch November 18, 2013 NASA MAVEN Launch November 18, 2013 NASA NASA-TV Highlights (all times Eastern Time Zone) • December 11, Tuesday • 10 a.m. – Coverage of Russian Spacewalk, scheduled to begin at 11:03 a.m. EST and will last around 6 hours (All Channels) • 8 p.m. – Live from The Washington National Cathedral: The Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum Presents “The Spirit of Apollo”—A Celebration of the 50th Anniversary of the Apollo 8 Mission to the Moon (All Channels) • December 12, Wednesday • 7:40 a.m. – German Media speak with International Space Station Commander Alexander Gerst of the European Space Agency (All Channels) • (No earlier than) 3 p.m. – RS-25 Engine Test (All Channels) • 10 a.m., 1 p.m. – Replay of The Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum Presents “The Spirit of Apollo”—A Celebration of the 50th Anniversary of the Apollo 8 Mission to the Moon (All Channels) • 3 p.m.-4 p.m. – International Space Station Expedition 59-60 Crew News Conference (All Channels) • 8 p.m., 10 p.m. – Replay of the ISS Expedition 59-60 Crew News Conference (All Channels) • December 14, Friday • 12 p.m. – SpaceCast Weekly (All Channels) Watch NASA TV online by going to the NASA website

8. Oct 10 - [Oct 08Near-Earth Flyby (0.029 AU) Space Calendar • Dec 11 - Chang'e 4, Moon Orbit Insertion • Dec 11 - Colloquium: In Search for Most Ancient Asteroids to Tell Us the Story of the Origin of Our Solar System, Tucson, Arizona • Dec 11 - Hyperbolic Object A/2018 W1 Closest Approach To Earth (1.651 AU) • Dec 11 - Webinar: The IPCC Process and our Changing Oceans, Ecosystems and Human Communities • Dec 11-12 - International Workshop: Dark Matter and Stars, Lisbon, Portugal • Dec 12 - Comet 46P/Wirtanen Perihelion (1.055 AU) • Dec 12 - Asteroid 9617 Grahamchapman Closest Approach To Earth (1.000 AU) • Dec 12 - Asteroid 477 Italia Closest Approach To Earth (1.533 AU) • Dec 12 - Asteroid 12382 Niagara Falls Closest Approach To Earth (1.896 AU) • Dec 12 - Colloquium: CSI Apollo - Recreating the Iconic Earthrise Photograph, Greenbelt, Maryland • Dec 12 - Colloquium: Searching for Helical Magnetic Fields in the Milky Way Galaxy, Sydney, Australia • Dec 12-14 - 9th Symposium on Large TPCs for Low-energy Rare Event Detection, Paris, France • Dec 12-14 - Workshop: The CMB in HD - The Low-noise High-resolution Frontier, New York, New York • Dec 12-14 - Aotearoa Fundamental Physics Workshop 2018: Observer-Dependent Entropy, Wellington, New Zealand • Dec 13 - VCLS 1/ CeREs/ ALBus/ CHOMPTT/ Da Vinci/ ISX (CP 11)/ NMTSat/ RSat-P/ Shields 1/ STF 1/ CubeSail 1 & 2/ TOMSatEagleScout (AeroCube 11A) & TOMSat R3 (AeroCube 11B)/ SHFT 1Electron Launch • Dec 13 - Geminids Meteor Shower Peak • Dec 13 - Comet 253P/PANSTARRS Closest Approach To Earth (1.640 AU) • Dec 13 - Apollo Asteroid 2015 XX169 Near-Earth Flyby (0.043 AU) • Dec 13 - Asteroid 7273 Garyhuss Closest Approach To Earth (1.350 AU) • Dec 13 - Asteroid 3852 Glennford Closest Approach To Earth (1.773 AU) • Dec 14 - Comet 137P/Shoemaker-Levy Perihelion (1.929 AU) • Dec 14 - Comet 198P/ODASPerihelion (2.006 AU) • Dec 14 - Amor Asteroid 2018 VS9 Near-Earth Flyby (0.083 AU) • Dec 14 - Asteroid 289586 Shackleton Closest Approach To Earth (1.394 AU) • Dec 14 - Royal Astronomical Society (RAS) Ordinary Meeting, London, United Kingdom • Dec 14 - Meeting: 30 Years of Planetary Astronomy with H3+, London, United Kingdom JPL Space Calendar

9. Food for Thought SwRi Solar Activity Research Provides Insight into Sun’s Past, Future

10. Space Image of the Week Earth Enveloped in Airglow Image Credit: NASA