Tuesday, April 29, 2014
Travel
More than a city: Barcelona
»p18
‘I’m lIke RAIn mAn’
Courtney Love Life »p13
Super hit of Dublin stargazer
Grief: A relative faints as news of the death sentences is reported Picture: reuters
‘Butcher’ judge sentences 683 to death at mass trial
A JUDGE at a mass trial in Egypt has sentenced 683 people to death – including the Muslim Brotherhood leader Mohammed Badie. The ruling follows the murder of a policeman and acts of violence linked to riots after president Mohammed Morsi was ousted last summer. Judge Said Youssef referred his
judgment to the Grand Mufti – the nation’s top Islamic official – for approval. A final decision will be issued in the Minya court in June. As the ruling was announced, female relatives of the defendants fainted and wailed as others cried out: ‘Why? This is unfair.’ One said: ‘This judge is a butcher.’
AN AMATEUR astronomer has celebrated his by eD cARTy latest celestial discovery from his back garden with with the naked eye, it’s about 100,000 times fainter,’ a cup of tea. Dave Grennan, 42, hit the jackpot in the heavens Mr Grennan said. The stargazer has written a specific computer proover his suburban Dublin home on Good Friday using a telescope he built himself which picked gramme to allow his telescopes to target certain galup a 170million-year-old dying sun 100 times the axies even if he is not in the shed. He then reviews hundreds of images with the naked eye. size of ours. ‘One of the misconceptions is that I’m out there in ‘It was 11 o’clock at night when I got the first look at this and by 1am I was fairly certain and at that the freezing cold and dark with a big coat on looktime of night there was nothing else for it but a ing through a telescope at the sky – most of the time, I’m inside watching TV.’ strong cup of tea,’ he said. When Mr Grennan made his second supernova ‘What excites me about this is the telescope – I built it myself, right down to the polishing of the discovery in 2012 he was contacted by Lomonosov Moscow State University which lenses.’ admitted its scientists had failed Mr Grennan, a 9-to-5 software to pick up on the discovery weeks developer, has discovered three earlier. supernovae or exploding stars Mr Grennan made the first disover four years from a shed at the covery of a supernova from Irish bottom of his garden in soil in 2010 and two years before Raheny. The latest discovery was that he discovered an asteroid confirmed by the International and named it after his late mothAstronomical Union which gave er, Catherine Griffin, who enit the unique name Supernova couraged his interest in the stars 2014as. when he was a boy. It was made in a galaxy which at Astronomy Ireland’s David this time of year appears beside Moore said: ‘He’s certainly Irethe constellation known to most land’s most prolific supernova people as the Plough. hunter.’ ‘You won’t see any trace of this Grennan: The hunt for supernova
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