Glad the Apollo 13 movie is getting reruns lately. This scene is even more moving today: right, Tom Hanks playing Jim Lovell; left, cameo appearance by actual Jim Lovell (1928 Mar 25 - 2025 Aug 7).

RIP Jim Lovell, a man from a time when the USA did things we could all admire www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

A newly minted Open University PhD. Congratulations Dr Annie Lennox!

Nice article featuring issues of diversity and inclusivity in planetary nomenclature by my student Annie Lennox. If folk don’t see their like represented, they are likely to feel excluded from the field. That’s unfair, but also we need all the talent we can get. geoscientist.online/sections/une...

youtu.be/pvT3aQjLxdE Here's a 🎶 twist on Coldplay's thumping #VivaLaVida we're calling "Puppets on a Kremlin String?" It reflects on the grotesque media spectacle hosted by #Trump & #Vance yesterday at the White House. In solidarity with Zelensky & Ukraine. #SlavaUkraini #Dontabandonthem

#PlanetParade had been overhyped, but here are Mars, Jupiter, Venus and last of all Mercury lurking at the lower edge of the band of grey cloud at tree top height. Video shot at 18:37 this evening.

#PlanetParade has been grossly overhyped by lazy journalists and colleagues keen to get on air. I caught sight of Mercury at 18:27 but Saturn was already too low. See pics. Venus is easy in the first 2, but you won’t spot Mercury except in the 3rd, magnified view. (Mars & Jupiter were lovely though)

Worried about losing access to US federal data that may go off-line, or already is? You’re not alone—but duplication isn’t the answer. Many ongoing efforts have already archived key datasets and many more are ongoing. Check out these existing resources and, if you can, support their work. 🧵

👇👇👇👇👇👇👇👇👇👇

Authors, if you see this it’s a sign to post the first line of your book. “Unless you are in the tropics (or witness a total solar eclipse) you will never see Mercury in a completely dark sky” Planet Mercury: from Pale Pink Dot to Dynamic World (Springer Praxis 2015)

Authors, if you see this, it’s a sign to post the first line of your book. “It would be meaningless to write about the discovery of our moon, the one that goes round the Earth - ‘the Moon’, as I shall call it from now on because that’s its name” - Moons: A Very Short Introduction

Alan Sugar: "The biggest disaster in my lifetime was us leaving the European Union." "If I was Prime Minister I'd be coming along on bended knee asking to be let back in."

Who else is wearing a #Churchill scarf today?

This is “Mercury confiding the infant Bacchus to the nymphs” by F Boucher, which I saw today at the Wallace Collection. Note the snakes wrapped around Mercury’s staff, which is why faculae on the planet Mercury are named after “snake” in a different language each time.

BepiColombo’s 6th Mercury flyby movie now online at youtu.be/Drh5agiQYzE?... Watch carefully and you will spot the planet reflected in the solar array too. This is the final visit to Mercury before we get into orbit on November 2026.

Mere twilight, or where the shadows lie. Here’s a view of permanently shadowed Tolkien crater at Mercury’s North Pole from yesterday’s flyby by BepiColombo. Story at www.esa.int/Science_Expl...

Captain, my captain! Great to see Diarmaid MacCulloch on University Challenge after nearly 50 years, and this time with his name spelt right.

I so enjoy Zoe's refreshing sanity.

Dark comets and decametre asteroids. My ineteriew for @NakedScientists with Dr Chris Smith, who dont seem to be on BlueSky yet eur01.safelinks.protection.outlook.com?url=https%3A...

New study shows majority of people who voted to leave EU would now accept return to free movement in exchange for access to the single market & similar support for a reciprocal youth mobility scheme. So when will the government catch up? @europeanmovement.co.uk www.theguardian.com/politics/202...

Well done team #OpenUniversity on tonight’s University Challenge! @oustudents.bsky.social

New type of hydrated sodium chloride (salt) discovered by my #OpenUniversity colleagues www.open.ac.uk/blogs/news/s...

Reform UK leader Nigel Farage says “We need to leave the ECHR so we can deport people that come illegally & take back control of our borders & that’s what the public wants” Share if you disagree with his populist boll**** the UK should join Russia & Belarus outside the ECHR youtu.be/iSTN-h8NoyY

This is a lovely video, and makes the trilobite look so real :-)

#BepiColombo MCCAM image from today’s (5th) #Mercury flyby at a range of 51000km. If you zoom into the pic you can see the whole of the Caloris basin. Its floor is covered by relatively bright lavas. The dark spot is Atget crater, exposing Low Reflectance Material. North is towards the bottom.

We won’t get any detailed images of #Mercury during Sunday’s flyby (the 6th and final flyby in January will do that!) but geometry means that we will get our first infrared look at the planet. #bepicolombo

@geolsoc.bsky.social panel discussion: “What does it take to get involved in space missions?” live right now: Jack Wright, Philippa Mason, Richard Gail, John Bridges.

Great presentation on Mercury by the Open University’s Jack Wright to kick off @geolsoc.bsky.social Geofutures conference, with good advice to early career researchers

Mercury geological mapping at the Open University: checking agreement at quadrangle boundaries

Refugee from Twitter, who has come to see if this is better.