RSID: <<2020-04-16T23:31Z MFSK-32 @ 9265000+1500>>
 

Welcome to program 148 of Shortwave Radiogram.

I'm Kim Andrew Elliott in Arlington, Virginia USA.

Here is the lineup for today's program, in MFSK modes as noted:

  1:43 MFSK32: Program preview (now)
  2:53 Rehearsal of Virgin's 747 "flying launchpad"*
  7:33 MFSK64: Asteroid 'Oumuamua might be planet shard*
11:28 This week's images*
28:34 MFSK32: Closing announcements

* with image(s)


Please send reception reports to radiogram@verizon.net

And visit http://swradiogram.net

Twitter: @SWRadiogram

 

From New Atlas:

Virgin Orbit puts its 747 "flying launchpad" through a full
rehearsal

Nick Lavars
April 14, 2020

Virgin Orbit continues to edge closer to its objective of firing
satellites into space form an airborne 747, this time completing
an end-to-end launch rehearsal designed to put all of its systems
through their paces. This major test will be the company's final
before its first launch demonstration flight, with the flight
apparently going off without a hitch.

Virgin Orbit hopes to one day offer a flexible and responsive
launch service for those looking to place small satellites into
orbit. Rather than having rockets lift off vertically from a pad,
Virgin Orbit aims to use a 747 that has been modified to carry a
rocket beneath its wing, which then launches toward space from
midair and takes a payload along for the ride. The plane then
lands on the airstrip like a conventional aircraft, ready to go
again.

It has carried out a number of test flights in recent years,
showing off its so-called Cosmic Girl mothership in action. In
late 2018 November, it started taking its LauncherOne rocket
along for the ride and then in July of last year, it dropped the
rocket for the first time to make sure the release mechanisms
were in working order.

Tuesday's captive carry test was different to those that have
gone before it, however. In previous tests, the fuel tanks were
filled with water to simulate the weight and balance of the real
thing. This time around, they were filled with liquid nitrogen
which was cryogenically cooled to be around 300 °F (185 °C)
colder than the water, which interacts differently with the
onboard hardware systems and calls for special handling by Virgin
Orbit workers.

According to the company, everything went swimmingly with the
"flying launchpad" returning to base with everything intact.
While noting this is the final step before its first proper
Launch Demo, Virgin Orbit hasn't offered a precise timeline for
that outing, only to say that is "squarely in our sights."

Sources: Virgin Orbit, Twitter

https://newatlas.com/space/virgin-orbit-flying-launchpad-full-rehearsal/

 

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Shortwave Radiogram now changes to MFSK64 ...
 

RSID: <<2020-04-16T23:37Z MFSK-64 @ 9265000+1500>>

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From Science News:

'Oumuamua might be a shard of a broken planet

Christopher Crockett
13 April 2020

The solar system's first recorded interstellar visitor has a new
proposed origin story. The enigmatic celestial object known as
'Oumuamua might be a shard of a planet ripped apart by its star's
gravity, researchers suggest April 13 in Nature Astronomy.

Ever since 'Oumuamua showed up in our solar system in 2017,
astronomers have struggled to explain its origin, suggesting that
it might be a wayward asteroid, a comet or even an alien
spacecraft.

Searching for other explanations, astronomers Yun Zhang at Côte
d'Azur Observatory in Nice, France and Douglas Lin at the
University of California, Santa Cruz developed computer
simulations in which planetary bodies got too close to their
parent stars.

In these simulations, objects ranging in size from comets to
rocky planets orbit relatively lightweight stars. The scientists
found that if these bodies repeatedly come within about 600,000
kilometers of their star - nearly 80 times as close as Mercury
gets to our sun - then the star's gravity shreds the objects, and
flings the fragments into interstellar space.
Sign Up For the Latest from Science News

If 'Oumuamua were such a fragment, that might explain its odd
shape, its tumbling motion and why it sped up as it left the
solar system. The simulated planetary shards tumble
and tend to be cigar-shaped, similar to 'Oumuamua. And such a
fragment could retain water ice deep within, the researchers say.
Buried ice could have produced water vapor as 'Oumuamua got
heated by our sun. If that gas escaped through porous rock, it
could have acted as a natural rocket, giving our fleeting visitor
a little nudge as it rounded the sun.

This origin story is a plausible one that links 'Oumuamua's
strange properties to planet formation throughout the galaxy,
says Gregory Laughlin, an astronomer at Yale University who was
not involved with this study.

However, Harvard astronomer Avi Loeb sees a plot hole in that
narrative. To account for the estimated number of 'Oumuamua-like
objects that must be whizzing around the galaxy, "one needs each
star to produce roughly a quadrillion such objects." But
planetary shredding should instead be rare, requiring the bodies
to pass through a tiny sliver of space around a star, he says.

And that's assuming a doomed object doesn't just evaporate rather
than break apart. "The statistics of such events makes the
proposed scenario unlikely," Loeb says.

https://www.sciencenews.org/article/oumuamua-broken-planet-fragment-comet-asteroid


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This is Shortwave Radiogram in MFSK64

Please send your reception report to radiogram@verizon.net

 

This week's images ...





One of the shortlist winners of the 2020 Sony World Photography
Awards is this view of the Marienplatz Metro station Munich by
Peter Plorin. From bit.ly/2wHnPae ...
 

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A spring scene in Slovenia: cherry blossoms amid the vineyard.
From bit.ly/2ygXvUP ...


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Aerial view of the Botanical Garden of Shijiazhuang, Hebei
Province, China, 12 April. From bit.ly/2VcTWId ...

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From a Deutsche Welle pictorial about German castles, the
Albrechtsburg in Meissen, Saxony. From bit.ly/3ckvvhS ...

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Wild bluebells near Halle, Belgium. From bit.ly/2z50L6e ...

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A male Mandarin duck walks along the Landwehr canal in Berlin.
From bit.ly/2VbX47n ...

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The sun rises behind a redundant oil platform moored off
Kirkcaldy, Scotland, as oil prices remain under pressure. From
bit.ly/2XFvNMj ...

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The Yellow Crane Tower at night, in Wuhan, China, 8 April. From
bit.ly/3eqiBki ...

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A US Postal Service employee in Manhattan. From reut.rs/2Vcuti7
...

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Our painting of the week is "Bench Azalea Garden" by Lisa
Blackshear. From bit.ly/2K5VAFg ...

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Shortwave Radiogram returns to MFSK32 ...

 

RSID: <<2020-04-16T23:58Z MFSK-32 @ 9265000+1500>>


This is Shortwave Radiogram in MFSK32 ...


Shortwave Radiogram is transmitted by:

 

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and

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Twitter: @SWRadiogram

I'm Kim Elliott. Please join us for the next Shortwave
Radiogram.

RSID: <<2020-04-16T02:49Z MFSK-64 @ 5850000+1500>>

This Is A Music Show #060
15 April 2020

2100-2200UTC Wednesday on 7780 kHz
0200-0300UTC Thursday on 5850 kHz

via WRMI, Okeechobee USA

Rebroadcast on Unique Radio, Australia
1000-1100UTC Friday on 5045 kHz USB


***ALSO***

TIAExpressMS w/ Radio Northern Europe International
via Channel 292 in Germany, on 6070 kHz.

Broadcast various dates/times. Check the schedule here:

https://www.channel292.de/schedule-6070-khz/
https://rnei.org/

----------------------------------------

PLAYLIST
 

Links of note:

Tortoise "play" Seneca on Chic-A-Go-Go (Chicago public access kids show)
https://youtu.be/hftbgPSF4gg

Suzanne Ciani on David Letterman, 1980
https://youtu.be/fZscRHkLMt0

-----

Please send reception reports/comments:

thisisamusicshow@gmail.com

Follow TIAMS on Twitter:

www.twitter.com/ThisIsAMusicSho/

------


Thanks for listening!

--YOUR HOST--



EOM



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