16 August
1920: On 16 August 1920, Sir Joseph Norman Lockyer died.Lockyer was a British astronomer who, in 1868, discovered and named the element helium that he found in the Sun's atmosphere. ...
27 FEB. 2004
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1877: On 17 August 1877, the American astronomer Asaph Hall discovered Phobos, a moon of Mars. He also discovered the second moon of Mars, Deimos, in the same year.
He named the moons Phobos and Deimos after the sons of Ares, the god of war in Greek mythology (in Roman mythology his name is Mars). Phobos and Deimos were Ares's sons by the goddess Aphrodite and served as his chariot attendants. 'Phobos' is Greek for fear and Deimos means 'panic'.
One theory on the moons' origin is that they are probably captured asteroids. An asteroid belt lies between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter and is composed of small planetary objects that may have failed to merge together into a larger planet.
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15 August
1993: On 15 August 1993, after more than three years of efficient and successful operations, communications with ESA's scientific satellite Hipparcos were terminated.The Hipparcos satellite, a purely European undertaking, and ...
14 August
2003: On 14 August 2003, while the ESA SMART-1 spacecraft was on the launchpad in Kourou, French Guiana, the Flight Operations team at ESOC mission control in Damstadt, Germany, was ...
13 August
1596: On 13 August 1596, David Fabricus discovered Mira, the first pulsating (and second variable) star. In 1603, it was seen, measured and cataloged by Johann Bayer in his Uranometria ...
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