THE WRIGHT STUFF Vol XVI w No 6 The Official Newsletter of the U.S.S. Kitty Hawk w NCC-1659 Nov / Dec 2005 C O N T E N T S A VIEW FROM THE CATBIRD SEAT ................................3 J.R. Fisher FRONT COVER PHOTO CREDITS ...................................3 NASA/JPL DEEP SPACE NINE - A SECOND CHANCE ............................4 Brad McDonald COMPUTER OPERATIONS REPORT .................................7 John Troan Volume 16 - Number 6 UPCOMING EVENTS ..............................................8 is a publication of the U.S.S. Kitty Hawk, the Raleigh, N.C., chapter of STARFLEET, an international STAR TREK fan organization. This publication is provided free of charge to all chapter members in good standing. Subscriptions for non-members are $12.00 per year (six issues). Please address all corres- pondence to CATBIRD Publications, 5017 Glen Forest Dr., Raleigh, N.C. 27612. This publication is a non-profit enterprise and is not meant to infringe upon any copyright or trademark held by Paramount Pictures, Gulf & Western, or any other holder of STAR TREK copyrights or trademarks. Unless otherwise noted, ENTIRE CONTENTS ARE COPYRIGHT Ó 2005 CATBIRD Publications, THE WRIGHT STUFF. Nothing in whole or in part may be used without the written permission of the publisher. THE WRIGHT STUFF assumes all material submitted for publication is gratis. The publisher and editors reserve the right to edit all submissions. Publisher ................... J.R. Fisher Editors .....................Jane Fisher John Troan TOOL BOX: Pentium IV-3.0GHz; HP LaserJet 1200 & DeskJet 722C; Lotus WordPro; Adobe Acrobat. IMAGES - Title Banner Wright Flyer from NASA/Ames PAO photo archive; U.S.S. Kitty Hawk (USN CV-63) from navicp.navy.mil; Constitution class cruiser from gwu.edu/~rljones/khawk. IMAGE - Featured Front Page Saturn moons Rhea & Dione from Cassini; Crab Nebula from Hubble space telescope; view of 'Burns Cliff" on Mars from Opportunity (with a photo model of the rover). A View From the Catbird Seat By J.R. Fisher Merry Christmas and the time and day will allow everyone will be a Creation event. It was happy holidays to all to get there on time with better suggested that we should try to go. of our crew and parking and no crowds. It is important Interested? We can discuss it further friends! It has been that I have a head count no later than at the January meeting. a long and the January 7th meeting! Maximum Also, at the January meeting we sometimes difficult of 36! Call early! need to decide about which dates we year for many of us, On another note, almost want to work the phones at the but it is quickly drawing to a close with everyone has renewed their Starfleet UNC-TV Festival this year. Festival a happy celebration and the hopes of membership; thank you. If you have will run from February 25th through a new year that will bring happiness not, please do so as soon as possible. March 26th. Let's try to do two and prosperity to everyone. I hope We are high on the list of ships with evenings with 20+ people each. each of you will have a safe and new members and renewals. Of Well, that's all for me for this happy holiday. course, your Kitty Hawk dues will be newsletter. I hope everyone has a We do not have a lot going on due at the beginning of the new year safe trip to wherever you go to this year so I will get to the meat of it. and our treasury has shrunk with our celebrate and return, and make the We have decided to have our giving to various charities this year. most of your time with friends and holiday/anniversary dinner at the So please pay them as soon as you family. Kanki at Crabtree again this year, can. We look forward to seeing thanks to the kindness of Tom Someone mentioned at the last everyone in January! Mukoyama, the manager and crew meeting that Paramount is having a Esse Quam Videri member. This year it will be at 7 p.m. 40th anniversary celebration of Star on Sunday, January 15th. Please call Trek at the Hilton in Las Vegas, me to reserve a seat. We hope that Nevada; probably in September and it Front Cover Photo Credits By NASA, JPL, et al. Saturn's Moons The mosaic shows terrain on the assembled at JPL. The imaging Saturn's cratered, icy moons, Rhea trailing hemisphere of Rhea (1,528 operations center is based at the Space and Dione, come alive with vibrant color kilometers, or 949 miles across), and is Science Institute in Boulder, Colo. that reveals new information about their centered on 42 degrees south latitude. For more information about the surface properties. North is up and rotated 28 degrees to the Cassini-Huygens mission visit To create these false-color views, left. http://saturn.jpl.nasa.gov. The Cassini ultraviolet, green and infrared images Images in the Dione false-color view imaging team homepage is at were combined into a single black and were acquired on Aug. 1, 2005, at a mean http://ciclops.org. white picture that isolates and maps distance of 267,600 kilometers (166,300 Crab Nebula regional color differences. This "color miles) from Dione. Image scale is 1.6 This new Hubble image -- one among map" was then superimposed over a kilometers (1 mile) per pixel. the largest ever produced with the clear-filter image of each moon. The image shows terrain on the Earth-orbiting observatory -- shows the The combination of color map and trailing hemisphere of Dione (1,126 most detailed view so far of the entire brightness image shows how the colors kilometers, or 700 miles across), and is Crab Nebula ever made. The Crab is vary across the moon's surface in relation centered on 41 degrees south latitude. arguably the single most interesting to geologic features. The origin of the North is up. object, as well as one of the most studied, color differences is not yet understood, The images have not been scaled to in all of astronomy. The image is the but may be caused by subtle differences show the moons' proper relative sizes. largest image ever taken with Hubble's in the surface composition or the sizes of The Cassini-Huygens mission is a WFPC2 workhorse camera. grains making up the icy soil. cooperative project of NASA, the The Crab Nebula is one of the most The Rhea view is a two-image European Space Agency and the Italian intricately structured and highly mosaic. Images in the mosaic were Space Agency. The Jet Propulsion dynamical objects ever observed. The acquired on Aug. 1, 2005, at a mean Laboratory, a division of the California new Hubble image of the Crab was distance of 214,700 kilometers (133,400 Institute of Technology in Pasadena, assembled from 24 individual exposures miles) from Rhea and at a manages the mission for NASA's Science taken with the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Sun-Rhea-spacecraft, or phase, angle of Mission Directorate, Washington, D.C. Telescope and is the high resolution 88 degrees. Image scale is 1.3 kilometers The Cassini orbiter and its two onboard image of the entire Crab Nebula ever (0.8 miles) per pixel. cameras were designed, developed and made. THE WRIGHT STUFF PAGE 3 NOV / DEC 2005 DEEP SPACE NINE - "A Second Chance" By Brad McDonald ACT FOUR QUARK SISKO (smiling) (moving) FADE IN: What can I do for you? Sisko to Kira. What's your INT. DEEP SPACE NINE - MEETING status? SISKO ROOM We want to question Garak, There is no immediate response, so All are present as before, but Kira has will you call for him? he tries again. still not arrived. Sisko is in a corner QUARK SISKO with Worf and Vanir working on a way (excited) (concerned) to counter the Cardassian claim. In Me? Why me? I didn't -- Sisko to Kira, respond please. the B.G., Quark is fussing with Rom on the details about the refreshments. WORF Worried, he tries another approach. (impatient) SISKO SISKO You are the arbitrator. You Advocate? Is there a way we Sisko to Odo, what's your have the power to require can counter their claim? location? testimony. VANIR There's a moment of silence and QUARK (nervous) Sisko tenses. (shrugging) I'm not sure. It depends on If you say so... ODO'S VOICE Garak Without him, they have (beat, puzzled) Promenade, thirty meters nothing. ...exactly how do I do that? from your location. I don't Sisko thinks for a beat, then calls to think we're going to make it, SISKO Quark. Captain. Advocate Vanir? Will you SISKO explain it to him? SISKO Arbitrator?! May we call you (impatient) on a point of order? ON SISKO Explain! Quark dismisses Rom and straightens Sisko moves to one side and taps his PROMENADE CORRIDOR #1 out his tunic. comm badge. A large, boisterous crowd is present. Kira is on the floor, kneeling next to Cover Credits continued useful to mission teams by enhancing Torkin, who has been wounded. Odo perspective and a sense of scale. is standing close by, monitoring the Opportunity on Mars Opportunity captured the situation. underlying view of "Burns Cliff" after This synthetic image of NASA's ODO Opportunity Mars Exploration Rover driving right to the base of this southeastern portion of the inner wall Torkin has been shot, by inside Endurance Crater was Bajorans. produced using "Virtual Presence in of "Endurance Crater." The view Space" technology. Developed at combines frames taken by Across the crowd, a security team is NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Opportunity's panoramic camera restraining two Bajoran civilians.