Author Archives: Chompsky

Behold: the Crescere – a 132m concept superyacht – green on the outside and green(isn) under the skin with a greenhouse, tropical garden and planted lounge area at its core, watered by an autonomous sensor and software system.

Huge glass panels on the hull admit sunlight and on the foredeck, a seawater swimming pool disappears when not in use to make room for a helipad. A electric-diesel hybrid engine powers electric motors with biofuel generators for general navigation, switching to diesel power for faster crossings.

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Behold: the 4 light years wide centre of M8, aka, the Lagoon Nebula – 4,000 light-years away within the boundaries of the constellation Sagittarius. To wit:

Visible light images show the glowing gas and obscuring dust clouds that dominate the scene. But this infrared image, constructed from Hubble Space Telescope data, peers closer to the heart of the active star-forming region revealing newborn stars scattered within, against a crowded field of background stars toward the centre of our Milky Way galaxy. This tumultuous stellar nursery’s central regions are sculpted and energised by the massive, young Herschel 36, seen as the bright star near centre in the field of view. Herschel 36 is actually a multiple system of massive stars. At over 30 times the mass of the Sun and less than 1 million years old, the most massive star in the system should live to a stellar old age of 5 million years. Compare that to the almost 5 billion year old Sun which will evolve into a red giant in only another 5 billion years or so.

(Image: NASA, ESA, Hubble; Data Archive: MAST, Processing: Alexandra Nachman)

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Behold: the Bandit9 X Royal Enfield Jaeger – a collaboration between the Indian manufacturer and Vietnamese custom shop Bandit9, based on the Continental GT 650 café racer.

Hand-made from surgical grade stainless steel, the combined tank, seat, and fender create a low profile, ultra-clean line with dual LED heads and strip tail lights, turn signals, custom handlebars and tucked-away wiring. 

Only nine will be made.

Yours (in kit form or fully built) from €23,500.

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Recorded before her death in 2019, 90 year old former Radio City Music Hall Corps de Ballet soloist, Paulette Harwood shares the energy and passion that characterised her subsequent career as a dance teacher in a poignant film by her grandson James Gallagher who sez:

…she was interesting before I knew what interesting was. I didn’t set out to make a film, I knew my grandmother and the school wouldn’t be around forever and I wanted to document it before she went away

shortoftheweek

A 34 image digital composite of the skyscape from Auriga to Orion- the fruit of a total of 430 hours of exposure. But what are we seeing? Many old friends of this series of posts, certainly. To wit:

Starting on the far upper left, toward the constellation of Auriga (the Chariot driver), is the picturesque Flaming Star Nebula (IC 405). Continuing down along the bright arc of our Milky Way Galaxy, from left to right crossing the constellations of the Twins and the Bull, notable appearing nebulas include the Tadpole, Simeis 147, the Monkey’s Head, the Jellyfish, the Cone and Rosette nebulas. In the upper right quadrant of the image, toward the constellation of Orion (the hunter), you can see Sh2-264, the half-circle of Barnard’s Loop, and the Horsehead and Orion nebulas. Famous stars in and around Orion include, from left to right, orange Betelgeuse (just right of the image center), blue Bellatrix (just above it), the Orion belt stars of Mintaka, Alnilam, and Alnitak, while bright Rigel appears on the far upper right. This stretch of sky won’t be remaining up in the night very long — it will be setting continually earlier in the evening as mid-year approaches.

(Image: Alistair Symon)

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