DATE: Monday, July 7, 1997                  TAG: 9707040442

SECTION: BUSINESS                PAGE: D5   EDITION: FINAL 

SOURCE: BY MARK EDELEN, PILOT ONLINE STAFF 

                                            LENGTH:   62 lines

WEB SITES PERMIT YOU TO ESCAPE THE CONFINES OF THE PLANET EARTH

It has been a big week for news from space, and that means it's a busy time for cyberspace as well.

The official NASA Shuttle-Mir Web site has been posting special status reports after the collision of the Progress resupply spacecraft with the Spektr module of the Russian space station. From the opening screen, click on the Hot Borsht section.

If you have patience or a fast modem connection, you can view video of the collision damage. The videos are in MPEG format, so you may need to download and install viewer software first. EyeQ from InterVU software (for Power Macs and Windows 95 machines) did the trick for us.

If you want the lower-tech alternative, the NASA Office of Space Flight has a Space Station Mir report with photos of the damage.

The Office of Space Flight also offers Mir naked-eye visibility data, showing how to locate the damaged space station in the sky. Unfortunately, Mir is not visible from Hampton Roads this week.

But from the home page for the Russian Space Agency, you will find Liftoff's J-Track Spacecraft Tracker, which plots, live, Mir's and other spacecrafts' positions over an easy-to-read map of the Earth. The map requires a Web browser that can read the Java computer language, so get at least the 3.0 version of Netscape Navigator or Microsoft Internet Explorer.

Also in space news this week, of course, is the Mars Pathfinder Mission, the probe to the surface of the red planet. The Jet Propulsion Laboratory in California is running a special Web site, copied to computers across the world to relieve overload. You'll find the latest news, loads of Mars facts and images, and details on the rover Sojourner.

In the that's-just-cool category, JPL thought enough of the work of artist David Palermo to link to his virtual reality tour of Ares Vallis, the landing site. The tour lets you navigate through the artist's 360-degree rendering of the area.

SPORTS FANS: The Virginia Roadsters, the Women's Professional Fastpitch team based in Hampton, has gone online. Visit their Web site for the 1997 schedule, scores and box scores, player statistics and staff profiles.

Langley Speedway, the NASCAR track in Hampton, also has sped onto the Web. Check standings, the schedule and ticket information. Add your own comments to the site's guestbook. A future column will dig deeper into auto racing online.

If you have a favorite Web site you think every race fan should have bookmarked, e-mail us at (pilot(AT)pilotonline) and we'll pass it along.

ANOTHER ANIMAL SHELTER: Last week, I told you about Hampton Roads animal shelters on the Web. I've been alerted to one I missed. The Chesapeake Animal Bureau Shelter posts descriptions and pictures of dogs and cats up for adoption. Of extra help are explanations of how each animal came to be in the shelter, so you know whether ``Sam'' and ``Ginger'' were strays, turned in by their owners, or confiscated in cruelty investigations.

NEW ON PILOT ONLINE: Kids' Kitchen, The Virginian-Pilot's summer cooking program for children 6 to 13, has its own site on Pilot Online. Register online for a free T-shirt until Friday, then come back weekly for new kid-friendly recipes. Previous recipes and question-and-answer forms needed to qualify for the T-shirt will be archived. MEMO: Got a Hampton Roads-related Web site you think everyone should

know about? E-mail us at pilot(AT)pilotonline.com; specify ``online

column'' as the subject.

Send Suggestions or Comments to webmaster@scholar.lib.vt.edu