Photo credit: Ryan Imperio
It’s that time again, time to reveal some of our favorite Astronomy Photographer of the Year 2024 winners. First up, we have Ryan Imperio’s ‘Distorted Shadows of the Moon’s Surface Created by an Annular Eclipse’, which was named the overall winner of the competition this year. This is actually a 30 image composite of the Sun, captured in Texas during the annular solar eclipse on October 14, 2023.
Photo credit: Ryan McQueen
No, this isn’t a heavily modified LaFerrari or Enzo Ferrari, just Ryan McQueen’s Insanity Jet Car, the world’s first powered by two Rolls-Royce Viper jet engines making over 18,000 horsepower combined. All of that power makes this unique vehicle fuel hungry, as it consumes up to 106 gallons (400 liters) of fuel in under two minutes.
The Legend of Zelda PowerA Wireless Nintendo Switch Controller is a great alternative to the much more pricey Pro alternative, and you can get one for $26.99, originally $44.99. Not just a standard controller, this one boasts mappable Advanced Gaming Buttons that you can program on-the-fly, mid-game, without having to deal with any system settings. Product page.
NASA / ESA’s Hubble Space Telescope captured a deceivingly calm image of the Pencil Nebula, also known as NGC 2736, located near the Vela Pulsar 815 light-years away in the constellation Vela. It was first discovered by Sir John Herschel in the 1840s, who named the nebula as such due to its linear appearance.
Archer Aviation delivered the first Archer Midnight eVTOL aircraft to the US Air Force as part of its AFWERX Agility Prime contract valued at up to $142 million. Power comes from 12 electric motors connected to six independent battery packs that enable Midnight to achieve a top speed of 150 mph.
A few years before the Apple iMac was unveiled, there was The Monorail, an all-in-one PC that came loaded with Windows 95. Priced at $999.95 USD ($2,006 in 2024), the Model 133 weighed in at a whopping 25-pounds and features a 10.4 dual-scan LCD (640 x 480 resolution) capable of displaying 256 colors.
Photo credit: Tesla Newswire
A camouflaged Tesla robotaxi prototype may have possibly been spotted at Warner Bros. Studio in Burbank, California ahead of the official event set to take place on October 10th. Tesla shareholders will have a chance to attend by entering a lottery here, as each share they hold is good for a single entry.
ESA’s BepiColombo spacecraft performed its closest flyby of Mercury yet during its latest encounter on September 4, 2024. The time-lapse video it recorded consists of of 128 different images captured by all three of BepiColombo’s monitoring cameras, M-CAM 1, 2 and 3.
Google Wallet will soon let you create a digital ID from your US passport, and doing so is as easy as following a few on-screen prompts. Once the process is complete, you’ll be able to use the ID at select TSA checkpoints for now, reducing stress when traveling domestically, especially if you forget the physical book.
