Bonus Riddle

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SOLVED!

Welcome to the bonus riddle.  Remember, the comments are closed until tomorrow, when we’ll open the riddle for anyone to try if it hasn’t been solved yet.  Here are the people who are eligible to send in three guesses by email:

Adrianus V, Dwight, Roger, Rob, Alex, Patrick, Kristian, Hugo, the Gregster, Andy, Gary, George, Claudia, Suzanne, Jeff Greene, Jon, and Jerry.

Tom and I will only verify receipt of your guesses, we will not comment.  We do verify your identity, also.

Ready?  Here you go:

This is a modern discovery.

Don’t look to WikiPedia to find the answer on this one.

It carries the name of a more well-known object.

This is near.

This is sometimes called “minor”, but that’s not what we usually call it.

Look at this image:

This beauty, image by Giovanni Dall'Orto, holds the key to your answer. The image is under copyright, so don't lift it from the blog, please!

That is your final clue.

There you go.  Good luck everybody, and I’ll let you know how it went tomorrow.

Vega Launched

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The first flight of ESA’s Vega rocket occurred yesterday.

The payload consisted of two Italian satellites: ASI’s LARES laser relativity satellite and the University of Bologna’s ALMASat-1. Flight VV01 will also carry seven picosatellites provided by European universities: e-St@r (Italy), Goliat (Romania), MaSat-1 (Hungary), PW-Sat (Poland), Robusta (France), UniCubeSat GG (Italy) and Xatcobeo (Spain).

One of Italian satellites aims to put Einstein to the test – this is VERY cool stuff.

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Don’t forget about the Bonus riddle and I’m thinking about having a Second Chance Riddle this Saturday, need to hook up with Marian on this before it’s for sure, but if all goes well.

Ancient Craters on Vesta

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Dawn shows Vesta's battered surface. Click for larger. Image Credit: NASA/ JPL-Caltech/ UCLA/ MPS/ DLR/ IDA

Craters look like bumps to you?  Try this.

I was looking at this image and was kind of surprised at the number of small craters.  The spacecraft was only ~118 miles (190 km) above the surface, mission managers are pretty confident in their “road map” LOL.

What really is amazing is the number of “weathered” craters, some of them are almost eroded away, they must be truly ancient. Before you say it, no, there is no “weather” as we know it on Vesta so the process is from what ever was/is hitting the surface over the eons. It all adds up over time.

The Dawn caption

In this Dawn FC (framing camera) image a large number of craters, formed by collisions into the surface of Vesta, are visible. The craters in this image range in diameter from less than 1 kilometer (0.6 mile) to approximately 4 kilometers (2.5 miles). Whether you are looking at a high-resolution or a low-resolution image, various types of impact craters dominate Vesta’s surface. The relatively large circular depressions in this image are older, heavily degraded impact craters. The craters with sharper rims are fresher craters. Clusters of small secondary craters were created by the impact of material and boulders that were ejected when larger primary craters formed.
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Knitting Needle Science

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Who knew?

Source

Last Chance Riddle

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UPDATE:  Solved at 8:55pm CDT by Gregster.

Here we are, the final riddle of this cycle.  The bonus riddle is set for Wednesday the 15th, so if your name isn’t on the list, this is your last chance.

Okay; ready to riddle?  Today’s answer is found in the real world.

NGC604 NASA/Hubble

Rather than one thing, it is a group of things.

It’s well known, in fact, for being a group.

One part of the group probably doesn’t really belong; however, one part (not previously associated) probably does belong.

The actor Jimmy Stewart

This is interesting because it’s such a colossal train wreck.

A fairly modern discovery, this is the first of its kind.

You saw this featured at the beginning of a movie classic, but you might not have recognized it.

When you look at this, you “see” something usually associated with sound.

A few flying horses

That’s about it.  Short and sweet, and to the point.  We’ve discussed this particular thing before, so some of the clues may be strangely familiar.  They ought to be.

"Hey! Don't take my picture!"

The Riddle Prize and the Mars Czar

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Exploring Mars: Chronicles from a Decade of Discovery

By Scott Hubbard (also known as the Mars Czar)

Published by The University of Arizona Press

So here is the Bonus Riddle prize.

I found the book to be to be a nice easy read.  The author, Scott Hubbard tells the story of the Mars Exploration, from the failures of the Mars Polar Lander and Mars Climate Orbiter after which he became program director through the Mars Science Laboratory that is on its way to the red planet right now.

I am very sure the winner is going to enjoy this book. If you are not so lucky you can get it from many sources including Amazon by clicking the link above.