Awesome Astronomy - May Episode Part 1

Paul Hill, Ralph Wilkins and Jenifer Millard host. Damien Phillips and John Wildridge produce. The Discussion: Recording from the Mars/Earth-analogue biome cottage at the AstroCamp starparty in the Welsh Brecon Beacons, we start off by discussing stargazing during a hurricane(!) and get ready for Jeni’s Pint of Science events this month. The News: Rounding up the astronomy news this month we have: - The rate of the universe’s expansion is 9% greater than we thought? - Greater understanding about the lakes of methane on Saturn’s moon Titan. - LIGO gets its jiggy on; giving us gravitational wave detections EVERY week! - The value of occultations to modern astronomy - A possible discovery of an exocomet! - And a round up of some of the best astronomy April Fool’s gags from last month, including how winter would come on a Game of Thrones type world. Main news story: The first ever image of a black hole The Sky Guide: Covering the solar system and deep sky objects on offer to amateur astronomers in May: An unwelcome dearth of solar system objects with Jupiter, Mars and Saturn low on the horizon, but dwarf planet Ceres is at opposition and we also have a few nice conjunctions to enjoy in May. Messier 5 and Palomar 5 globular clusters in Serpens and Messier 57, and the Ring Nebula, and the Double Double in Lyra. Main Object: the much-overlooked Northern Star, Polaris. http://www.awesomeastronomy.com Bio: Awesome Astronomy is a podcast beamed direct from an underground bunker on Mars to promote science, space and astronomy (and enslave Earth if all goes well).   We've added a new way to donate to 365 Days of Astronomy to support editing, hosting, and production costs. Just visit: https://www.patreon.com/365DaysOfAstronomy and donate as much as you can! Share the podcast with your friends and send the Patreon link to them too! Every bit helps! Thank you! ------------------------------------ Do go visit http://astrogear.spreadshirt.com/ for cool Astronomy Cast and CosmoQuest t-shirts, coffee mugs and other awesomeness! http://cosmoquest.org/Donate This show is made possible through your donations. Thank you! (Haven't donated? It's not too late! Just click!) The 365 Days of Astronomy Podcast is produced by Astrosphere New Media. http://www.astrosphere.org/ Visit us on the web at 365DaysOfAstronomy.org or email us at [email protected].