Retired physicist, teacher, meteor scientist. 3M teaching fellow. Father, grandfather. Mt A, Western alum. Textbook author. Views those of invisible rabbit.

Victoria, BC Canada
Joined January 2011
Robert Hawkes retweeted
"Heard a loud crash, found a hole in the ceiling, smelled a strong sulfur-like odor. " What would you think? This New Jersey homeowner then carefully collected the meteorite pieces in glass jars. Analysis shows it was once a piece of an ancient, briny world. The type of asteroid that originally brought water and life's building blocks to Earth. details/images: science.org/doi/10.1126/scia…
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Robert Hawkes retweeted
Back from a mission to the moon 🌕, astronauts from Artemis II visited UN Headquarters in New York. They shared an important message for humanity about our shared purpose on Earth. 🌎 Watch and see what the #Artemis explorers had to say.
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Robert Hawkes retweeted
Start your week with some new photos from Artemis II! Though our journey around the Moon has ended, we're still retrieving plenty of new images. Keep an eye on our Artemis II multimedia gallery for image highlights from the mission: go.nasa.gov/4usiN8W
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That's an interstellar comet, imaged by a satellite orbiting Mars. You live in the future! esa.int/Science_Exploration/… @esa
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Robert Hawkes retweeted
Birthday submission count: 2,807,463. 🎂
Replying to @arxiv
How many articles do you have on arXiv?
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Infinite gratitude to the amazing sponsors and exhibitors powering #AstroRob 2025 and every edition before. You make it a first-class networking event every time — thank you for being a part of it! 🌌✨
Sponsors and exhibitors also make #AstroRob conferences possible! Want to be part of this awesome community for the next one in Almería (6-10 Oct)? Check out how to join and support: astrorob.com/sponsors-exhibi…
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What physics breakthrough do you think will happen in the next decade? ✍️
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Robert Hawkes retweeted
Cliff Pickover
@pickover8 Jul 2025
Physics. Mathematics. Reality. Universe. Stephen Wolfram's "Theory of Everything" is free on line, as a 448-page PDF. Here is a sample figure, to intrigue you. Source: arxiv.org/abs/2004.08210
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This has never happened before. Every living former NASA Science Chief united to sign a joint letter to Congress, urging them to reject a devastating 47% cut to NASA’s science budget. Led by our board member and former NASA Associate Administrator of Science John Grunsfeld, we helped bring this letter to life. Read the full letter here ⬇️ planetary.org/press-releases…
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Robert Hawkes retweeted
A view of lightning that's nothing like what we see on the ground: crew observations and instruments on the @Space_Station can help us better understand the behaviors of storms.
Just. Wow. As we went over Mexico and the U.S. this morning, I caught this sprite. Sprites are TLEs or Transient Luminous Events, that happen above the clouds and are triggered by intense electrical activity in the thunderstorms below. We have a great view above the clouds, so scientists can use these types of pictures to better understand the formation, characteristics, and relationship of TLEs to thunderstorms.
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ESA's astronomers are actively tracking 3I/ATLAS, which is now the third confirmed interstellar comet to pass through our Solar System! More info at: esa.int/Space_Safety/Planeta…
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Robert Hawkes retweeted
There's a new interstellar comet in the neighborhood! Known as 3I/ATLAS, this comet poses no threat to Earth – but it does provide a rare opportunity to study an object that originated outside of our solar system: science.nasa.gov/blogs/plane…
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Robert Hawkes retweeted
Replying to @b612foundation
@b612foundation has taken the orbit and uncertainty of asteroid 2024YR4, sampled 10K trajectories from the current uncertainty, and propagated them forward. 2.3% of those hit the Earth on Dec.22, 2032. Here is where they hit.
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Robert Hawkes retweeted
Here are 70 clones of #asteroid 2024 YR4 that do hit Earth, highlighting the impact risk corridor. There are some big cities along that line: #Bogota, #Lagos, #Mumbai.
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☄️ Excited to share our new paper in JGR: Planets @jgrplanets: "Inferring Fireball Velocity Profiles and Characteristic Parameters of Meteoroids From Incomplete Data Sets" by myself and @GritsevichMaria ▶️ doi.org/10.1029/2024JE008382 #PlanetaryScience #Meteoroids #Fireballs
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Moon landing in 6 days! RESILIENCE is orbiting the Moon every 2 hrs, to land on Mare Frigoris (Sea of Cold). Rover TENACIOUS to explore & collect samples. Soft landing to everyone at @ispace_inc! en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hakuto…
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Robert Hawkes retweeted
Well over $20B in taxpayer, paid for assets being thrown away for a savings that's literally pennies on those dollars. I'm all for shrinking waste and increasing efficiencies in our government, but this is neither. science.org/content/article/…
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Robert Hawkes retweeted
#asteroid #Apophis, at naked-eye brightness (mag 3.1) races across Barcelona's night sky on the evening of Friday, April 13, 2029.
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