Adjust your watch..

The Feb. 27 magnitude 8.8 earthquake in Chile may have shortened the length of each Earth day.

JPL research scientist Richard Gross computed how Earth’s rotation should have changed as a result of the Feb. 27 quake. Using a complex model, he and fellow scientists came up with a preliminary calculation that the quake should have shortened the length of an Earth day by about 1.26 microseconds (a microsecond is one millionth of a second). More.

Also, as a result of the earthquake, there is a lot of activity on Amateur Radio frequencies of 7050, 7060, 7088, 7095.  As there is a contest next weekend, please listen carefully before using these frequencies. More.

STS-130

I have always been interested in the shuttle missions. There is, I guess a natural curiosity about anything to do with space. I’ve observed a few launches that passed through the sky’s over Ireland. I saw STS-127 on the launchpad, and then streaking across the sky over Ireland.  What I hadn’t done (before yesterday) is listen to voice communications from the Orbiter directly.  I’ve tried a few times, but not really persisted.

Yesterday at approximately 09:30 I snagged the following Audio Clip on 259.7MHz AM.  Suffice it to say, it made my day. Many thanks to the Hearsat folks for putting up with my dumb questions. Also I must agree with Hugh, it was probably the prettiest launch I’ve ever seen.