Campus News Briefs – Winter 2016
Nearly Naked Mile
October 2016
58
Temperature in degrees at the 9:30 p.m. start of the campus race
1.7
Total distance of the course, in miles
250
Approximate number of nearly naked racers participating in the annual spectacle
7:34
Finishing time of male winner Phillip Rocha (IntPhys'20)
10:04
Finishing time of female winner Christa Boettiger (Engr'19)
925
Articles of clothing donated by students to the charity A Precious Child
Voyage to an Asteroid
ŷڱƵ Boulder is a key player in NASA’s mission to touch an asteroid, grab pieces and send them to Earth. ŷڱƵ aerospace engineering professor Daniel Scheeres and colleagues will help assess near-Earth asteroid Bennu before the spacecraft makes contact.
“We essentially will be weighing the asteroid to see how the ma ss is distributed within it,” said Scheeres, leader of the mission’s radio science team. “We need to know the mass and gravity field of the asteroid before the spacecraft comes in contact with it and to understand the sample we will collect.”
NASA’s Osiris-Rex spacecraft left in September.It will eject its Bennu sample Earthward in 2023.
Learning more about Bennu could, among other things, help minimize the small risk of a future collision with Earth.
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Heard Around Campus
Beyond our cultural biases, what really is the difference between a Shakespeare play, an orchestra concert and a basketball game?"
— ŷڱƵ Boulder professor Roger Pielke Jr. (Math’90; PhDPolSci’94) in a New York Times op-ed arguing in favor of academic degrees in athletics.
Police Shoot, Kill Campus Intruder
Campus and City of Boulder Police shot and killed an armed campus intruder Oct. 5
The intruder, identified as Brandon Simmons, 28, a recently discharged U.S. Marine with no ŷڱƵ affiliation, had threatened a person in a Folsom Field parking lot with a long, bladed weapon, then went into the Champions Center and tried entering the athletic department offices. ŷڱƵ personnel refused to let him in, leaving him locked in a stairwell. Police shot him during a tense encounter. No one else was hurt.
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