#42 - December 2015

The Discussion: In this Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy
contrived episode we look back over the movie The Martian,
meeting Canadian astronaut Chris Hadfield, we gloss over the
Bayesian statistics in Jen’s data analysis work and hear about a
mathematics-based nightmare that’s been keeping Jen awake but
should have mathematicians rolling in the aisles!


The News: This month we revisit that alien megastructure around a
distant star with an unusual light curve and reveal what alien
signatures SETI have discovered. We take a look at the possible
future of cheap access to space as British Aerospace buy a stake
in the SABRE engine designed to power spaceplanes of the future,
and we finish off with the truly incredible measurements of Mars
atmosphere conducted by NASA’s MAVEN spacecraft to reveal how
much atmosphere Mars is losing on an annual basis.


The Interview: This month we wrap the whole show around our
interview with Apollo 15 Command Module Pilot Al Worden recorded
at this year’s Cosmiccon. We discuss:


Anecdotes from test pilot school in England


Tales of the Harrier and Concorde test pilots


Practical jokes


Riding a Saturn V rocket


Finding organic matter in lunar orbit


Views from 1.5 miles above the mountains of the moon


The history of the moon and the Apollo 15 landing site, Hadley
Rille


The bliss of being alone in lunar orbit


The views of space from the far and dark portions behind the moon


The vastness of the universe


Al Worden's view on UFOs, ancient aliens, numerology and the
bible


How to explore further out in space


The stupidity of the design of NASA's next generation spacecraft


The 5 Minute Concept: We continue our series of back to basics 5
Minute Concepts as Paul takes a look at perhaps the most
important piece of hardware in amateur astronomy – no, not the
telescope itself, but the mount. As we ask AZ or EQ?


Q&A: Listeners’ questions via email, Facebook & Twitter
take us on a journey into the astronomy issues that have always
plagued our understanding or stretched our credulity. This month
Jen honours the 100th anniversary of Einstein’s General
Relativity with a beginner’s crash course, a bit of mythbusting
and answers:


What’s inside a black hole? John Barrie from Swansea, Wales via
email