The Red Planet: 78,000 Earthlings Apply for Mars Citizenship

It seems quite a few Earthlings are anxious to get off this Big Blue Marble; more than 78,000 people have already signed up to be citizens of Mars...whenever the Red Planet should become colonized!

The Netherlands-based non-profit organization Mars One is seeking qualified candidates to colonize Mars in the future. To be a successful applicant, you must possess intelligence, resourcefulness, courage, determination and skill, as well as psychological stability, said Mars One ambassador Gerard 't Hooft, a Nobel Prize-winning theoretical physicist. Candidates must also pass a strict health examination and be physically fit in order to be included.

There is a minor filing fee for all applications, which range from $5 to $75, the amounts based on the gross national income of the applicant's home nation. The fee for US citizens will be $38. Since announcing the search in late April, the organization has already been flooded with applications from interested parties, with over 78,000 currently being processed and examined to see if they meet eligibility requirements. Although there is no maximum age limit to be considered, all applicants must be over the age of 18 and have the ability to speak and communicate in English.

Mars One estimates it will need at least $6 billion to send just the first four inhabitants to begin the Red Planet colony, with an additional $4 billion needed to launch each subsequent crew. In addition to the application fees, the organization hopes to raise money via a reality television show that will follow its astronaut selection and training process.

Mars One plans to put its astronaut finalists through seven years of rigorous training and testing exercises that will expose them to all potential situations they might encounter during the daring mission. The astronaut trainees will also have to spend some time living in mock Mars colonies here on Earth and communicating with Mission Control via a 6 to 20-minute time delay to simulate the lag between a signal being sent and its arrival on Mars.

The organization plans to have selected 24 qualified candidates by July of 2015. As of yet, no space craft has been announced to ferry the astronauts to their new homes. (Luckily, the time frame is after Comet Siding Spring might impact the planet in October of next year!)

If you are interested in applying for the trip to Mars, you may do so here:

"Great" Comet ISON Will Be Visible in Daytime Sky Next Year

Photo of Comet ISON taken November 10, 2013, shows blue coma and a double tail! Photo by Michael Jäger of Jauerling Austria

 Update: December 31, 2013: Is ISON still there or isn't it? The general public is still getting the runaround regarding if Comet ISON is still alive, but a recent posting from an amateur astronomer claims to have discovered what is believed to be the debris cloud of the comet (above photograph).

Update: Although currently not as bright as astronomers predicted it would be at this time, Comet ISON is still putting on a spectacular show. Scientists believe it will survive its close encounter with the sun and perhaps be visible to the naked eye by mid to late November, 2013!

A recently discovered comet will make an extremely dramatic flyby past Earth and give our planet a spectacular show.

Comet ISON was discovered this week by Russian astronomers Vitali Nevski and Artyom Novichonok. The new comet is officially known as C/2012 S1, with ISON an acronym for the International Scientific Optical Network, the telescope used to discover the comet.

At  its perihelion (its closest point to the sun), due on November 28, 2013, Thanksgiving Day in the United States, the comet will come within 800,000 miles of the sun’s surface and could evolve into a dazzling celestial body, possibly bright enough to be visible in broad daylight. [edit:] National Geographic has stated on their official site that the comet WILL be the brightest in human history and will be brighter than a full moon.]

The possibility of the comet being visible in the daytime skies will make it one of the most exciting comets to whiz past the earth in a long while. Comet ISON will be barely visible to the unaided eye when it is in the predawn sky positioned against the stars of Leo in October 2013. ISON will then travel north after perihelion and become visible during December both in the evening sky after sunset and in the morning sky before sunrise in certain latitudes of the planet. Just how bright it will be and how long the tail may get during this time frame is not yet known, but it is possible it will be one of the greatest comets in history, if it does not break up while approaching the sun, as comets tend to do.

The prophet Nostradamus had quite a bit to say about comets and the 2012 "time frame":
Quatrain II.46
After great misery for mankind an even greater one approaches, when the great cycle of the centuries is renewed. It will rain blood, milk, famine, war and disease. In the sky will be seen a fire, dragging a tail of sparks.
Quatrain II.41
The great star for seven days will burn, The cloud will cause two suns to appear: The big mastiff all night will howl, When the great pontiff changes countries.

The great star in the quatrain is believed to be a comet while the "cloud" is the comet's coma or tail.

Mother Shipton also made similar prophecies:

A fiery dragon will cross the sky - 7A: The first comet cluster appears.
six times before the earth shall die (has died). - 8: It has appeared 6 times before. (Comet ISON is believed to be an "offspring" of the Great Comet of 1680)
Mankind will tremble and frightened be - 2: Pervasive global fear, 1926 - 2026.
for the six heralds in this prophecy. - 1: Mass death - Subject of this Prophecy. 

Simulation of how Comet ISON will look in the sky during daylight hours. Photo credit Universe Today.

Bridge Over Troubled Water: Glacier Melt Takes Out Greenland Bridge and Roads

In what could be a sobering and frightening preview of things yet to come, a runaway glacier melt has washed away an important bridge and roadway in Greenland.

The glacier melted in only four days. The glacier normally retreats during the northern hemisphere summer months, but the melt this summer has been unprecedented. NASA imagery from space showed the Russell Glacier had melted by some 40% on July 8. The same satellite imagery from only four days later shows that the glacier had melted by an astonishing 97%, which would break all previous records according to climatologists studying the effects of climate change.

The incredible burst of fresh water took out the vital bridge over the Watson River at Kangerlussuaq, Greenland, an important part of the infrastructure used by scientists and locals alike to cross the glacier river. The bridge and roadways also link to the island's largest airport. This sudden melt-off follows another recent incident, where the Petermann glacier in Greenland collapsed, with an ice chunk twice the size of the island of Manhattan breaking away from the ice shelf.

The bridge was constructed during the 1950s, but can no longer handle the summer glacier run off due to the changing climate conditions in the region. Replacement of the bridge and roadways could costs hundreds of millions of dollars.

The Tide Is High: Scientists Say Sea Levels Rising Faster Than Expected

Sea levels around the globe could rise by as much as two to three times faster than previously expected, according to a dire new report released by think tank US National Research Council.

The committee of climate experts re-evaluated the latest United Nations estimates and updated them with new data regarding polar ice-cap melting and concluded the melt-off is accelerating the rise in sea levels worldwide at a far faster rate.

 By the year 2100, the National Research Council estimates that global sea levels will rise on an average between 20-55 inches (50 and 140 centimeters). A United Nations panel on climate change in 2007 had projected a rise of only seven to twenty-three inches worldwide during the same time frame.

In terms of near-future sea level changes, the committee has predicted a rise in coastal water levels by three to nine inches by the year 2030 with a rise of up to 19 inches by 2050.  These rates are considerably higher than predicted in a report released by climate experts in the year 2000.

The committee was initially convened by an executive order from California to assess sea level rise in order to make preparations for coastal impact, and to make the first detailed predictions for the US West Coast. The study concluded that Oregon and Washington State would perhaps be less impacted by the rising tides, as tectonic activity in the region is actually causing  land in the area to rise higher.

The study also concluded that the change in sea levels would continue to contribute to the increase in severe and catastrophic weather events globally.  The study predicted that seismic activity in California could cause a sudden rise in sea levels along the coastline by as much as a meter (3.3 feet), with devastating results.

Flight of the Butterfly: Early Canadian Red Admiral Migration Worrisome

Thousands of beautiful Red Admiral butterflies have descended upon dandelion-covered fields in Ottawa, Canada, in a worrisome northern migration, weeks ahead of their normal schedule.

Butterfly experts believe that this Spring's unusually warm season-the warmest ever recorded in large parts of the United States and Canada-is to blame for the off-kilter migration. The Red Admiral (Vanessa Atalanta), which resembles a smaller version of the Monarch butterfly, can be found in more temperate climates across North America and Europe. The species usually migrate north in late-Spring. The current migration comes almost a month before the usual time of migration.

Edward Bruggink, a greenhouse manager at Ottawa's Carleton University, commented on the early migration: "It's a bit of a shock," Bruggink said. "Everything's out of whack. Things are not the way they should be at the moment." Experts are concerned that a cold snap, which will bring much-colder temperatures to the area along with snow and high winds this week, will endanger the delicate butterfly species.