BellaOnline Forums Education Astronomy Doodling Spacecraft *new article*

Let's look at some doodles celebrating space missions. If you ever search with Google, you may have seen the doodles before. They're drawings and animations celebrating people, events, holidays, inventions and whatnot, incorporating the Google logo in an amusing way.

Doodling Spacecraft

There's another possible doodle for Cassini's first dive of the Grand Finale. Here's the Cassini doodle that Google didn't use. Cute, but I think the other one is definitely better.

ESA made a series of cartoons detailing the Rosetta mission, in which the spacecraft Rosetta and the lander Philae were characters. Although told as a story, they also - with some anthropomorphism! - accurately tell what happened. Here is the tale of the lander Philae. Awww. Too cute.

Here's a three and half minute video that explains Cassini's grand finale.

In July 2017 Juno flew over Jupiter's Great Red Spot - an enormous storm that may have been going for centuries. The spacecraft got so close to the planet that at some point it couldn't image the entire storm at once. The image shows the approximate angle that JunoCam was able to see at that time.

In Britain the Royal Mail created a special postmark to celebrate Philae's landing on the comet. It would be applied to anything mailed on November 14, 15 or 17. Great idea, I thought. I have a friend who collects astronomy-related stamps, and although this wasn't exactly a postage stamp, it still seemed rather special. So I popped a card in an envelope and mailed it.

Boo, Royal Mail! It arrived pristine at its destination. Not a single mark on the envelope except where I'd addressed it. Sigh.

A cute little animation of the New Horizons encounter with Pluto. (Credit: BennuBird) No tears now - remember, it's just a cartoon.