This "research" is to help improve the realtime simulations. For the Messenger Mercury Flyby 2 I plan to integrate "live" images from the solar system simulator (http://space.jpl.nasa.gov). Having read through various discussion boards, I noted that reference was made to that site being down during the Phoenix landing, and assuming that the same may occur on 6 Oct, it would probably be sensible to host time critical images on the same server as the realtime simulation. Hence my questions:
When did space.jpl.nasa.gov go down?
When did it come back up?
If anybody remembers, please let me know.
Thanks!
Daniel, I was wondering if there was any way to integrate your script with the http://www.shatters.net/celestia program.
It would make for some nice 3D visualisations that Outreach people could use and then fly around.
Just a thought.
Astro0
Glen, I am not a Celestia specialist and would not be able to answer your question on the fly, though it seems like a good idea.
There are quite a few Celestia spacecraft add-ons at http://www.celestiamotherlode.net/catalog/spacecraft.php I dont know how good they are. Some add-ons have an *.xyz file which seems to be the trajectory information consisting of four variables: time, x, y, z ... which is exactly the info I extract from JPL's Horizons system (need to find out which reference system Celestia is using). Thus it "should" be straight forward to plot a spacecraft trajectory in the solar system and pinpoint its position at any given time. However, I would not know (at this time) how to show additional information (events countdowns, distance to fly etc). A Celestia applet in the javascripts would be nice too, or remote controlling the viewing parameter of Celestia from a website, but I have no idea if it is possible.
On that note, I am itching to release the beta version of the Space Outreach Library, but I am still horribly busy at the moment :-(
BTW, is the CDSCC planning any event on 6 Oct for the Messenger Mercury flyby 2 (C/A is at something like 3:30pm Canberra time)
I don't think that CDSCC will run a specific Outreach event for Flyby2. I suspect that there won't be much coming out 'live' from the mission anyway. Certainly I'll be watching and probably reading through UMSF as events unfold.
We'll obviously be adding any new images to our wider public program however.
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