Nasa is appealing to Radio Amateurs worldwide to collect and categorize the condition and number of 'The West Ford Needles' as they this week begin falling to Earth. They were intended for µwave relay tests in the pre-telecomms satellite era but their orbit has now deteriorated, and they will this Spring begin Earth re-entry through the Tropopause. Deployed in 1961 West Ford Pt1 put 350M tiny wire dipoles into orbit utiising the Agena 2nd-stage, and launch-vehicles from the Atlas series used equally on Project Gemini. See the Clumps of West Ford Pt 2 and 'Westford Drag' Needles remaining in orbit: http://stuffin.space/?intldes=1963-014AA&search=westford
Moving on from April 1 Here it is, the first-ever image of a supermassive black hole. The effort to photograph it required an international team of 200 scientists and a virtual Earth-sized radio telescope to collect the necessary data. Then it took two more years of supercomputer processing and analysis to ensure that no errors were made. “Making an image of a black hole doesn’t come easily, as many people can tell you,” said Shep Doeleman, an astrophysicist. https://www.theverge.com/2019/4/10/...lack-hole-sagittarius-event-horizon-telescope This is not amateur 'Ham'. Did I need to point that out? I guess I just need to remind myself. Maybe you think!
