Site News 

I would like to begin by thanking all of the visitors to this web site. I appreciate all the nice comments I have received. 

Now for some Site News

9 Aug 09

I guess the biggest site news is that the site is back up.  I am in the process of updating the information and fixing some of the lost links. The FrontPage extent ions that I have been using have changed a bit and I am trying to chase down all the new bugs. I took about a 1 1/2 year retirement then received a call from Kennedy Space Canter wanting to know if I would like to come back out and teach on the Space Shuttle Program.  They made me an offer I could not refuse so for the last year I have been teaching Solid Rocket Booster Ordnance ,handling and safety along with a few other topics. I also had the pleasure of teaching the Hubble Repair Mission class for the ground support personnel. 

My health is still not very good, and I have to struggle to use my neck (which you REALLY use in astronomy) but hopefully I will be able to continue the hobby for as long as I can. Again, it will take me a while to get everything in order, but I am looking forward to an active web site again. Please tell your friends and help show me it is worth the bucks to do this : )  Feel free to drop me a note and as always comments are very welcome. Thanks to all.

9 Dec 06

Seasons' Greetings to all

A lot of news to update you folks on. First off, after 15 years of working at Cape Canaveral, the contract I had been working on has ended.  That being said, I am now considering myself as retired. This is happening about 4 years earlier than I had hoped, but taking all into consideration I am getting tired. The good news is that should make a lot of time available to pursue my hobbies and other interest, the bad news is that a good amount of my expendable income will disappear.  This change in financial status also coincides with the renewal of my web host service. Based on the number of hits and traffic observed over the past few months, I am considering taking the web site down.  I have noticed that the hits from January 06 (12,205) has dropped by almost 50% in November 06 (6,198). At this time I am looking at beginning the shutdown of the web site on 2 Jan 2007. Some of the pages and information will be moved to  my personal web page and I will provide that link to those interested.  Thanks again to all those who have communicated to me through the web site. It has been a lot of fun. 

31 July 06

If you sent an email recently (from about 15 June to 30 July) and did not receive a response, it was due to a mail failure. Something happened with the jbastro.com mail system that jammed up several weeks mail. I am not really sure of the exact dates. When I reset the mail system it damaged my PST file on my home system and I lost quite a bit of my stored mail. I was able to restore mail from my last backup, but it appears that everything after the 10 of July to the 29th of July has been lost. I try to answer all email sent to JBASTRO.COM in a timely manner. If you sent an email and did not receive a reply, please accept my apologies and if you would...please send it again and I will try to get you a reply as soon as possible.   Thanks for your understanding. 

9 Jun 06

  It has been some time since the last update.  Although my overall health has improved a great deal, my neck is still a significant problem. Arthritis is causing significant problems in the area below where the vertebrae were fused. This has put me in a LOT of pain and hindered some of my activities, most notably my astronomy. I never realized HOW MUCH you use your neck in observing. (I know...it holds your head on). So far this year, I have only been out a couple of times to grab a quick view or two of Jupiter and Saturn. I certainly have not lost interest in astronomy, I am just going though a pretty rough time that is very discouraging. Anyway...I am confident that over time things will improve and I will be able to get back to the level of involvement I have enjoyed in the past. 

I also want to thank those of you who have stopped by and left messages of encouragement. I do appreciate it.  Well..that is about it for now. Best wishes to all of you and keep looking up.

24 Dec 05

I would like to take a moment to thank everyone for the holiday wishes and for continuing to visit this site. I would also like to wish all a very happy holiday and best wishes for the New Year.  I added a link on my About Me page to some very special members of our family. We recently adopted two hurricane kittens and they have been a real joy to watch. If you get a moment check out Boomer, Sooner, Duke, and Cassie.

Again, thanks to all and best wishes for a prosperous New Year.

7 Dec 05

It seems like most of the Site News updates over the past year have been dealing with health issues. Unfortunately that has been the norm for the past year or so. I had surgery on my spine to repair some pressure on my spinal cord a few months back. They went in through the front of the neck and fused several vertebrae and did some other repairs. Unfortunately, I had some complications and several setbacks that has sidelined me from doing much with Astronomy. The neck is a very important part of the body when it comes to looking up : )  I have kept up with the site and had some very nice eMail exchanges with people regarding astronomy and equipment, but have had little opportunity to get out and enjoy the hobby. Hopefully that will change soon.

I would also like to take a moment to wish everyone a very happy holiday season and best wishes for the new year. Thank you all for dropping by the site.  

30 Apr 05

I noticed it has been a while since I updated the site news. Things have been going quite well here and I would again like to thank all of you who send email regarding my recent health issues. It seems like my warranty has expired. After over 50 years of never going to a hospital (as a patient) and no significant problems, it seems that it is my time to catch up. In any case, thank again.

I have had a few opportunities to get out and play with some of the equipment recently. Views of Saturn and Jupiter have been pretty good, but the seeing has not been up to par here locally. I have been trying out the C9.25 and finally feel I have the collimation up to par, and I can say that I am really enjoying it. 

The site has been receiving a good number of hits over the past few months. I am very happy with my web hosting service and have renewed with them for another two years, so this site should be up through 2006 (it's paid for anyway : )

There are a couple of items I would like to mention.

1.  I have received a number of contacts asking me to place a link to their sites here. If you have a link that you feel would be beneficial to amateur astronomers, please forward it to me for consideration. I will not add a link to a commercial or retail site unless the site offers a considerable amount of information that would aid the average amateur astronomer. Yes, I know I have a couple of links in my equipment comments to commercial sites, but they are usually sites that offer a unique item.

2.  Although I am flattered, by the couple of offers to sponsor this site, I am not interested in placing commercial advertising here. This is a personal web site and I consider it a hobby, not a business. 

3. If you have any comments or recommendation for improving the site, please let me know. I will see if it is something that can be implemented. 

END OF AN ERA

Last night (29 Apr 05) the last Titan launch vehicle lifted off  from Cape Canaveral AFS. The vehicle lifted off at 8:50 EDT . This night launch was beautiful as the vehicle lifted of into the clear night sky. Ignition of the core vehicle and the separation of the Solid Rocket Motors was very clear in the night sky. We were able to follow the powered flight through stage 1 separation. 

This final launch from CCAFS closes the book on a system that started here in 1957 with the Titan 1.  The Titan II  launch vehicle was used as a weapon system and a space launch vehicle. The Titan II booster system was used during the manned Gemini  launch vehicle and a was also placed in hardened silos as a weapon system for many years. The Titan III, Titan 34, and Titan IV have served as the heavy lift launch vehicle for years. Many memorable space probes were propelled toward there destination by the Titan launch vehicle, including the Cassini spacecraft currently performing research at Saturn. 

Having spent many years working on the Titan (both as a Titan II Combat Crew member and here at Cape Canaveral on the Titan IV program), I must say that there was a deep feeling of sadness as I watched that beautiful launch. This was the last launch of the Titan from Cape Canaveral. The final launch of the Titan system will be from Vandenberg AFB, Ca. in July of 05

26 Dec 04

I hope that everyone had a nice Christmas holiday. Things are getting back to normal here and I have finally had an opportunity to get out and do a little bit of viewing. If you looked at the equipment section, you most likely noticed that I sold the Discovery 10 inch PDHQ and picked up a Celestron C9.25. It is a bit easier for me to roll out the CAT for viewing in the driveway. So far things have been working out quite well.

  I would again like to thank those of you who have sent messages of concern regarding my health. I am very happy to report that the recovery  is going very well. I would like to wish all of you the best for the New Year. 

15 Oct  04

Well...a lot has happened over the past couple of months. I would like to thank those of you who left messages of concern. Three hurricanes (Charlie, Francis, and Jeanne) and a heart attack has kind of put astronomy way on the back burner. First off....there was a good amount of wind damage to the area from the two hurricanes. Kennedy Space Center took a pretty hard hit from Francis, with substantial damage to the huge Vehicle Assembly Building and several other facilities.  Locally there were a LOT of trees and signs down and power is still being restored in the area. Full power was finally restored to my street on 14 Sept.

To make the situation even more entertaining, on Saturday morning the 4th of Sept, while visiting my family in Oklahoma,  I suffered a heart attack. Fortunately I was close enough to a fine hospital (Comanche County Memorial Hospital, Lawton Oklahoma) with a top notch cardiac team (Thank you Dr. Woodson) and within a couple of hours they were into my heart putting a stint in and performing angioplasty. I am in the recovery mode now, but am doing quite well.  If you are ever in the position of experiencing chest pains and you are not sure what it is.....GET TO THE EMERGENCY ROOM. The sooner they can treat you the better you chance survival and a full recovery. 

28 Jun 04

I added a couple of excellent Lunar Atlas links. Both of these are outstanding reference for beginner to intermediate Lunar observers. Check them out if you get a chance. Just click on the helpful links text on the home page.

If you know of any outstanding non-commercial links that you think would help others, drop me an email and provide the link and I will add it to the site. 

30 May 04

Well....it looks like the cataract surgery was very successful. I am regaining some of the sensitivity in my right eye and the images are really beginning to come in. Contrast is much improved. The most notable affect is sensitivity to secondary color.  It seems that the old natural lens in my eye had yellowed with age to the point that it was acting as a filter. Now with the new lens, I see chromic aberrations a lot more than I did before. All in all I am very happy with the outcome. If you are suffering from the effects of cataracts, see your doctor and have it fixed. There is too much to see out there. 

8 Apr 04

Well, I am now recovering from Cataract surgery in my right eye, so I am back to working on the web site a bit.  I had this surgery on the left eye back in 2000. It is strange to have new lenses in my eyes. It sure takes a bit of getting used to. One thing that is certainly obvious is the fact that the new lens that replaced the old yellow natural lens is much more sensitive to color, especially CA in optics. I noticed that after having my left eye done, but since I am right eye dominant, I seldom used my "bionic" eye. Now that both eyes have been done, I have no choice. It will be a week or so before I can make any kind of determination as to how the new acrylic lens in my right eye compares with the silicon lens in my left eye. I have several new areas to add and a new scope to put up in the equipment area. I just received a Tele-Vue 76 and will be posting pics and comments on it as soon as I have an opportunity to give it a try. It is the same size as the Pronto but has a bit higher grade of optics in it. Initial terrestrial views are very promising. I do not see any fringe on high contrast objects.  

30 Jan 04

I would like to set up an area for allow guests to show off their  astro equipment . If you have a telescope or other astro item that you would like to have placed on the site then follow these simple instructions.  Send an email with the comment you would like to make about your setup. A general description of the key components and how you use the system would be great. Bottom line is anything you want me to post along with a photo. Attach a photo of your setup.  I will not display any personal information unless you specifically request it. I would like to use your first name and State. I will post any additional information that you request (like an email address). You will retain all rights to the photo you provide, but I must have your authorization to re-size or crop the photo to fit the screen format of the Web Site.  I have no provisions to provide specific protections for the use of your image other than on this site. 

When I collect enough inputs to fill the first page I will begin posting users photos in the Equipment section of this site.

29 Dec 03

.We are now hosted on a  full web server and domain. I will take a few days for all to get set up and for me to adapt to the new system, but hopefully I will be able to add a lot of new features and perhaps even some services to the visitors. One thing I would like to make very clear is that this will remain a personal web page and will not provide ANY commercial services.

If you have any suggestions or recommendation for making this a better site, please drop me a note.

Thanks again,

John 

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