When comets collide with small asteroids or spacecraft, they can breakup into smaller comets and sungrazer comets as shown in the picture of the Comet 57P/du Toit-Neujmin-Delporte. The fragments are spread over millions of kilometers.

On July 4, 2005. NASA plans to collide a 370 kilogram spacecraft into the Comet 9P/Tempel 1. The ensuing 16,000-megaton explosion will shatter the 140 billion antimatter metric ton comet into trillions of pieces. Based upon to my computer model, the antimatter fragments are going to collide with Mars, Earth and Sun in the subsequent years.

In 2110, metric ton antimatter fragments will start colliding with the Earth and producing 10, 000 megaton explosions. As trillions of fragments continue to migrate toward the Sun during the 22nd millennium, thousands of 10 to 10,000 megaton explosions will devastate Earth’s environment. Humanity will be brought to the brink of extinction.

Over the centuries, trillions of fragments will drift toward the Sun. When the antimatter fragments, called sungrazer, collide with the sun, multi-billion megaton explosions produce enormous sunspots and solar flares stretching millions of kilometers into space.

I have written NASA Office of Space Science and had discussions with NASA’s personnel. They have a general understand; but unfortunately, they don’t comprehend a 16,000-megaton explosion with a comet. I have request NASA cancel the Deep Impact launch scheduled for December 30, 2004.

We at NASA appreciate your interest in this matter. Please keep us informed of any further research you may be attempting into this or other related subjects.

Regards,

Dr Hertz Lottly
NASA Office of Staff Morale

(Hat tip: Cecil on Skeptical Community)

Posted by: Pixy Misa at 12:07 AM | Comments (6) | Add Comment | Trackbacks (Suck)
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I can deal with that.

It's cheerfully snarfing electrons right now. A bit later on I'll take it for a stroll and see what sort of photos it takes.

* My old phone is a Nokia 7110. When I went to buy a new charger for it a year ago, the woman in the store wondered what it was. She'd never seen one before... Come on, it's not that old!
** We're rolling out our ADSL service next month and he's one of our guinea pigs. I have to be contactable 24/7 in case he loses internet access.***
*** Which doesn't seem to happen now that we have a few modem settings ironed out.

Posted by: Pixy Misa at 09:45 PM | Comments (4) | Add Comment | Trackbacks (Suck)
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First problem: Most of our servers are in racks, but most of our servers aren't rack-mounted. They're little Compaq mini-towers; we bought dozens of them cheap when the line was discontinued (we also use them as desktops). They're not particularly fast, but they're quite reliable. So we have shelves in the racks for the servers to sit on.

Now, some bright spark had positioned the shelf immediately above this server so that there was all of, oh, half a millimetre of clearance. Since the server itself was sitting on the floor, and the frame of the rack itself sticks up over an inch at the bottom, I had to first remove two other servers and the shelf before I could move the server I wanted. Fortunately, neither of the two servers on the shelf above were critical (our backup internet server and the remote-access server), so I just yanked them out, undid the screws, twisted the shelf sideways and up to get it around the cables, and it was free.

Second problem: I grabbed the server and tried to hoick it out of the rack. It didn't move. Was it caught on something? No... Can't see anything. Wiggle it a bit... Wiggle... Wiggle. Ah. Now lift. Grrrrgh.

The reason it wasn't moving is that it weighs about seventy pounds. It's the size of a standard mini-tower, though about six inches deeper, but it appears to be constructed entirely of cast iron.

They don't make them like that any more. Thank God.

This little cutie weighs all of 2.9 pounds, and it's faster, has more memory and more disk space than the cast iron cow now sitting on my desk. Admittedly it doesn't have expansion slots or hot-swap drive bays, but ooh, shiny.*

* Is it just me or is the CD in that picture upside down?

Posted by: Pixy Misa at 09:20 PM | Comments (9) | Add Comment | Trackbacks (Suck)
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BZZZZAP!

_{Oh, yeah.}

Anyway, since I have nothing to write about at the moment, here are some helpful safety tips for all the budding helicopter pilots in the audience, from our friends at NASA:

Thank you for your interest in flying safely.


To most people, the sky is the limit.
To those who love aviation, the sky is home.

Basic Flying Rules:
1. Try to stay in the middle of the air.
2. Do not go near the edges of it.
3. The edges of the air can be recognized by the appearance of ground, buildings, sea, trees and interstellar space. It is much more difficult to fly there.

Oh, and I have some Easter eggs here. They were in the stores on the second of January. Possibly even earlier, but I was avoiding that whole shopping thingy the previous couple of weeks.

Mmm, chocolate...

Posted by: Pixy Misa at 07:40 AM | Comments (5) | Add Comment | Trackbacks (Suck)
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We got our money's worth out of that year, you bet.

Posted by: Pixy Misa at 03:20 AM | Comments (4) | Add Comment | Trackbacks (Suck)
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And for everyone else, yes, that's what all the noise is about.

Posted by: Pixy Misa at 01:30 AM | No Comments | Add Comment | Trackbacks (Suck)
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