So, it’s now officially Spring. March came in like a lamb and the first day of Spring has turned out to be quite a nice day. Hopefully, this is a preview of the next few months until summer arrives.

These words were uttered by Julius Caesar who was taunting Titus Vestricius Spurinna, an Etruscan haruspex who had warned Caesar that something bad would befall him. In this case, Spurinna had the last laugh, so to speak, because later in the day Julius Caesar was assassinated by his enemies.

Other notable things that happened on this date in history:

• Christopher Columbus returned to Spain in 1493 after his first trip to the Americas.
• South Carolina became the first American colony to set up its own independent government in 1776.
• The first World Contact Day with organized in 1953 by the International Flying Saucer Bureau
• The Godfather was released in 1972
• symbolics.com, the first .com domain was registered on the Internet in 1985

As well, one of my good friends celebrates her birthday today. Happy birthday to her!

All week I’ve been adjusting my watch forward and backwards, culminating in last night’s rollback. (You did remember to set your clock back, right?)

Saturday saw me set it forward an hour when I arrived in Halifax for a few days, combining business and pleasure.  I had a great time visiting Peggy’s Cove on Sunday where the weather was absolutely amazing with sunshine and 18C.

Saltwater must run in my veins because I lost track of time sitting on the rocks watching the waves crash onto shore. Feeling the salt spray on my face was incredibly relaxing.

I also visited one of the memorials to Swissair flight 111, which crashed into the ocean about 10km offshore of Peggy’s Cove in 1998. Two monuments were built, one near Peggy’s Cove and the other in Bayswater. There are sightlines at both monuments which triangulate on the actual location of the crash.  Very impressive.

On Monday I met up with my co-worker and we spent the next couple of days working in our regional office. Wednesday morning we headed to the airport and caught a flight to Ottawa. I parted company with her and met up with my boss at the gate for the flight to Winnipeg, where I spent the next couple of days.

Arriving in Winnipeg meant setting my watch back 2 hours compared to Halifax, which I had adjusted to during the four days I was there.

The weather in Winnipeg basically grey and wet almost the whole time we were there. The forecast kept warning of impending snow, but I’m happy to report that we didn’t see any snow while we were there.

The time change caught up with me, so it always felt like it was about two hours later than it really was. And since we were working weird shifts in the regional office, it only got worse. By the time we left Friday morning, I had no idea what time it really was.

Arriving home Friday afternoon meant setting the clock forward an hour. I dragged my suitcases upstairs and promptly fell asleep on the couch for a couple of hours.

It’s now sometime on Sunday and I’ve dutifully adjusted my clocks again, this time to switch over to Eastern Standard Time. Consequently, everything feels out of sync again.

At least it’s sunny out.

Near the end of January, I posted some pictures I took of sunrise one morning. Last week, on the first day of Spring, I took some more pictures at sunrise. Here’s a photo from each day, side by side for your viewing convenience:

January 21, 2009

March 20, 2009

The astute observer will have noticed that the sun is rising 10 to 20 degrees to the left of where it did on January 21st. This got me to thinking that there’s an experiment you can try at home based on this difference.

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Or you can watch it here.

A tip o’ the hat to XUP for giving me the idea for this!

@BadAstronomer re-tweeted a link to some photos of the space shuttle and the International Space Station taken about an hour before they docked yesterday evening that’s worth a visit. If a similar opportunity exists when they separate, I may try to take some pictures, too.

The BBC has a story reporting that an Iridium communication satellite attempted to occupy the same time-space coordinates as a non-operational Russian satellite somtime on Tuesday. Since the laws of physics generally do not allow this sort of thing to occur, a large cloud of debris has taken their place.

In practical terms, this means that there’s now a whole lot of new things in orbit that can potentially hit other satellites in orbit. The impact took place in a higher orbit than the International Space Station, so it is not considered at high risk. If everything goes well, the pieces of debris will come out of orbit without hitting anything in the process and burn up harmlessly in the atmosphere. Based on the report, NASA isn’t worried about the ISS being hit by the debris in the immediate future.

Since man started lobbing objects into orbit, there have been 6000 satellites launched. In addition to the satellites, there have been other things such as rocket boosters and associated bits and pieces, tools, gloves and even a spacesuit (minus astronaut) that have found their way into orbit. Usually, these things come out of orbit fairly quickly, but they can sometimes remain in orbit for months or years. Occasionally, pieces make it back to Earth, sometimes with non-trivial results. COSMO-954, a Russian satellite, broke up over northern Canada, scattering radioactive debris from its nuclear reactor across the Northwest Territories in January 1978. You can read about Operation Morning Light on the Geologic Survey of Canada’s website.

I saw a strange glowing spiral cloud when I was at the cottage during the summer of 1992, which I later learned was a satellite coming out of orbit. Some people may be treated to a rather unique spectacle if they’re in the right place at the right time when the pieces de-orbit.