moon

Viewing the April 8, 2024, total solar eclipse in the Adirondacks

The Adirondack Explorer newspaper up in the Adirondacks assigned me to research and write this story on the upcoming April 8, 2024 total solar eclipse. One of the best places in the northeast to view it will be in the Adirondack Mountains. When the sun, Earth and moon align What to know about this rare celestial event By Mark Marchand Residents and visitors will get a chance this spring to witness a stunning cosmic phenomenon that hasn’t occurred in the Adirondack region for nearly seven centuries. On April 8, a complex orbital…

Continue ReadingViewing the April 8, 2024, total solar eclipse in the Adirondacks
Read more about the article Commentary: For a break from despair, look around and look up
1968: The lunar orbital plan profile for the manned Apollo 8 shuttle - its proposed trajectory around the moon to assess potential landing sites for future Apollo missions. (Photo by MPI/Getty Images)

Commentary: For a break from despair, look around and look up

My guest commentary was published in the Times Union of Albany, N.Y. on May 22, 2022 Getty Images Are we as a species so mired in our current misery that we’ve metaphorically taken our eye off the ball that could help us? The existential crises demanding our attention pummel us continually. Grim news of the deadly global pandemic, accelerating climate change, the Russian invasion of Ukraine, political maneuvering aimed at autocracy, paycheck-eating inflation, and other calamities pile up daily. It’s easy, then, to understand why so many of us think we live…

Continue ReadingCommentary: For a break from despair, look around and look up
Read more about the article The 50th anniversary of landing on the Moon – A personal reflection

The 50th anniversary of landing on the Moon – A personal reflection

It’s been a half century since we landed on the Moon. It was an important moment in my life and, I suspect, for millions of others. I have spent years studying the nine-year NASA program, leading up to the Apollo 11 landing on July 20, 1969. During that time, I have read hundreds of historical records, books, and other accounts of this amazing achievement for humankind, attempting to find some sort of personal meaning. I wrote about it in this Op Ed published last weekend in the Times-Union daily newspaper in Albany,…

Continue ReadingThe 50th anniversary of landing on the Moon – A personal reflection
Read more about the article ‘I’m being followed by a Moon shadow…’

‘I’m being followed by a Moon shadow…’

(Headline: Lyric from "Moon Shadow," written and sung by Cat Stevens, 1971) It's Aug. 21, 2017, and much of the Western Hemisphere is glued to TVs, the sky, and computer screens. Let's meet our players for the afternoon's drama. First there's the sun, the fiery provider of heat and light to our precious planet. Our own personal star is hurtling through the cosmos at a relative speed of about 45,000 miles per hour. The second participant is our faithful satellite, the moon. At a distance of about 240,000 miles from its mother…

Continue Reading‘I’m being followed by a Moon shadow…’