Medoc

It's been a while, but I finally made it out to Medoc last night. The forecasts most called for about 50% clouds and 95% humidity by midnight and after. The CSC however called for no clouds, and fortunately it was right.

Five people brought scopes, ranging from two 18" dobs to a 5" newt on an equatorial mount. Alexey, one of my co-workers, came out for the first time with his new scope (the 5").

The sky was mostly clear, but the transparency was bad. Andromeda looked a bit unimpressive (compared to how it normally looks). NGC 891 was lacking in contrast, making the central dark lane more difficult than usual to see. The transparency seemed to change by the moment, and there would be brief moments of somewhat better clarity. Even so, everything was just a bit dimmer than usual.

Fortunately, the humidity did not cause too much trouble with condensation.

I went through a lot of the usual suspects, and it was great fun. Lots of Messier galaxies and their NGC neighbors.

The Orion nebula always looks great. There were moments when the atmosphere was steady enough to reveal six stars in the Trapezium, but there were also moments when it was difficult to get the primary four focused at 120x.

Eventually Saturn came up and looked nice, although turbulent. The rings are at a bit more of an angle now, and I could pick out three moons in close proximity. Rhea and Titan were fairly obvious on one side, and Dione was peaking through the haze on the other side.

Around 11pm, the sky conditions got noticeably worse. Everything was dimmer. We looked at a few last objects, and then the last scopes were packed up right around midnight.

It was a fun evening, and it was great to see some astronomy friends again. Despite the less-than-ideal conditions, I was more than happy just to be out observing.

Perseids 8/12

I got settled at Farrington around 11:15pm on the night forecast to be the peak of the Perseids. The sky was about 70% clouds, but the clear part centered on the radiant. I saw a few Perseids before the storms rolled in.

Quite an electrical show ensued for about 90 minutes. Two strong but small cells passed just SW of us. Pittsboro got rained on hard I believe, but Farrington didn't get a drop. The storms passed over the lake where US-64 crosses, so that gives you an idea of how close we were. Interestingly, through most of that period, the 30% of the sky around the radiant stayed fairly clear.

At 1:10, the sky suddenly cleared. Over the next hour, I saw 15 Perseids, and 3 non-Perseid meteors. There were a few good fireballs, one in particular that was excellent. It was interesting how they seemed to come in waves. 3-4 in just a few minutes, and then 10 minutes of nothing.

While waiting for meteors, I determined that the limiting magnitude in the darkest part of the sky was right around 5.1. The glow to the NNW was very bright tonight. Perhaps it's brighter in general than the last time I was at Farrington? (which may have been last year's Perseids) Also, while the sky was 70% clouds, the orange glow on the clouds was bright enough to seriously diminish my ability to see the clear portion of the sky.

There were quite a few people out. I'd say at least 20 people cycled through while I was there, but most were gone by the time the sky cleared. It's a real shame that they didn't get a better show.

Almost Heaven Star Party 2009

I'm finally catching up on observing reports, thanks in part to inspiration from a fellow observer. Robert Nielsen, a friend, fellow observer, and fellow CHAOS member, has started his own observing blog and written about MASP. That means I'm two star parties behind in my reports!

Almost Heaven happens up in the mountains of West Virginia, in the National Radio Quiet Zone. This year it was September 18-22. I drove up the day before and stayed the night in Staunton, VA. I tried to stay up late to get into an observing schedule, and checked out just under the 11am deadline the next day. I grabbed lunch in Harrisonburg, then headed into the mountains. From Harrisonburg, I lost cell phone reception quickly, which I wouldn't regain for days. It was a little over two hours through winding mountain roads to get to the star party. The last few miles were pretty rough terrain for my Fit, especially being so loaded down. We made it fine though.

Upon arriving, it was apparent that there was a ton of open space, although most of it was fairly hilly. I camped in the area where you can drive in to load/unload, but must park elsewhere. As I drove around that area, my car was dragging a bit through the grass. Not the sound you want to hear! I found a relatively flat area and got everything setup.

Attendance seemed to be mostly people from Virginia and West Virginia, with a smaller number of people from elsewhere. There must have been well over a hundred people. My area never got very crowded, but the camper area with cars and tents was packed.

The facilities were adequate. It was nice to have hot meals served, but perhaps not worth $30/day, especially if you sleep in and miss breakfast. I'll probably bring my own food next time.

For observing, I'll cut right to the most exciting part: we saw the Zodiacal Light! It looked like a small, thin band of clouds extending from the great square up toward the zenith, intersecting the Milky Way at perhaps a 40 degree angle. However, it didn't move, and we saw an airplane pass through it without disappearing, so it was almost certainly not a cloud. Through my telescope, that part of the sky looked completely normal.

The evening was fairly clear, despite some early clouds. The humidity got very high, and dew was the worst I've ever experienced. My secondary dewed over despite having its heater on! This was my first outing with an 8x10 canopy, which made a huge difference. I put my table, chair, and associated equipment (eyepieces, books, filters, etc) under the canopy. They stayed completely dry, because dew seems to fall vertically onto surfaces.

And now some selected observations:

M13 and M92 both looked spectacular as you would expect.
NGC 6702/3 is a small galaxy pair that seemed to be hiding among the stars.
M56, a fairly small globular cluster in Lyra looked very nice, while subtle. I resolved about 15-20 stars in the core at 293x.
NGC 7448- moderately bright galaxy with a long elliptical shape.
NGC 7463-5 is a galaxy trio. 5 was clearly the brightest, while the other two were just barely detectable.
NGC 7479- Another long, elliptical galaxy. I could see a bit of swirl on the southern side.
Pegasus 1 Cluster- I could only see 2-3 members, probably because the humidity was getting bad.
M15- spectacular globular cluster, resolving hundreds of stars all the way to the core at 293x.
M2- big, bright globular cluster. Slightly blue, with what seems like a dark lane on the south side.
Andromeda Galaxy- I viewed this primarily with my Canon 15x45 IS binoculars, and it was stunning! It filled nearly the entire field of view, and both companions were plainly visible.
NGC 7814- a galaxy with a bright ball of a nucleus, and a long thin ellipse which is brighter to the south.
M33- beautiful. The spiral arms are very obvious.
Dumbell- bright! the full ellipse is visible. The south end was a bit brighter, while the north end was a bit wider. It looked best at 205x with an OIII filter.
Little Dumbell- small, bright, and its namesake shape was clearly defined.

I went to bed around 2am, because I was just too tired to continue.

The next day, the weather was beautiful. I read, met some neighbors, and ate a couple of times. Sadly, the clouds started rolling in around 6pm. As it got dark, I got in about 20 minutes of star cluster observing before the clouds completely shut us down, but this all happened before astronomical twilight. The clouds would remain for the rest of the star party. I stayed up talking with neighbors a bit, but hit the sack by 11. It was spooky when I got up to use the bathroom around 2:30. The clouds eliminated light from the sky, so it was even darker than usual. Plus, everyone was in bed, which meant there were no lights at all or other activity.

The next morning I packed up and headed home. I wanted to stay to at least go on the Green Bank Radio Telescope tour, but I was concerned that the impending rain might make it difficult for my car to get off the mountain. This is another good reason to bring your own food- if you leave early due to bad weather, you don't have to forfeit $30/day worth of food!

It was a short trip, but a good one. It was only my second star party, and it felt good to just get out there and relax for a bit. The skies were very dark, although I'm not sure they were substantially darker than Pettigrew. Perhaps on a less humid night it would be better.

Kure Beach 8/26/09

This past week, I spent three nights at Kure Beach, which is on the outer banks of North Carolina just south on Wilmington. We rented a house on the beach with some friends, and the first evening proved great for observing. I brought my 10x50 binoculars and Celestron 4" f/9.8 refractor.

The back of the house faced directly east. As it was getting dark, I brought out the binoculars to show my friends the moons of Jupiter and our own moon. Once it was dark, I found M13 quite easily right overhead. After showing some friends how to find it, I noticed that Sagittarius was in an ideal positing in the south, and we had a great view. I started making my way up the Milky Way.

The giant open cluster M7 was a great target since everyone could see it naked-eye. Seeing was surprisingly good, so we had good contrast in the binoculars despite the light pollution.

The globular cluster M22 was spectacular. It looks so large and is pretty easy to spot even for a complete newbie. From there, I started panning up and hit M8, M20, M16, Swan Nebula, and Wild Ducks with lots of other little gems mixed in. This was now officially the most fun I've ever had with binoculars.

Quite pleased, I looked around for other targets and went searching for the Dumbell Nebula. Despite the neck contortion, it was easy to find and looked quite ghostly among such a dense star field. At this point, I decided to get the telescope out.

I setup the 4" refractor on the second-floor balcony facing the beach. The extra height gave us an even better view of Sagittarius. We hit all of the same targets with the telescope, plus the Ring Nebula. Seeing was very good, and in still moments I could resolve a lot of stars in M13. On Jupiter at 200x, I could see three bands and easily see that the middle one was split by a white stripe in the center.

By about midnight, I looked out over the water and realized that the Andromeda Galaxy was in a nice position and easily visible naked-eye. It looked beautiful in the binoculars and the telescope as well.

We ended the observing there, and everyone had a blast. It was really refreshing to have a ton of fun with a simple set of binoculars and a modest refractor. I also enjoyed the tracking feature on the equatorial mount, especially since I am so used to re-adjusting dobs between each guest viewer.

I am eagerly anticipating next week's arrival of 15x45 Image-Stabilized binoculars made by Canon. As much fun as the 10x50s were, I'm sure the IS and extra reach would have taken things to a new level.

Morehead Viewing Session

On Saturday, July 25, I went out to the Ebeneezer Church Recreation Area for the Morehead Planetarium's skywatching session. I brought the heavy artillery, plus my 4" refractor. I arrived an hour early so I could get a good spot and get everything setup.

Upon arriving at 8pm, there was a bit of weather looming. Some small rain clouds were slowly approaching, so I held off on setup. By 8:30, they still hadn't passed. A look at the radar showed two small green specs headed our way, with nothing else for hundreds of miles. What luck! We got a few minutes of drizzle, but then it began to clear.

It seemed pretty safe by 9pm, so I setup the refractor. I went right to M13 and showed that to quite a few people. I couldn't get any stars to resolve in it yet, but it still wasn't fully dark. This was my first chance to test the tracking motors and home-brew power adapter, which worked very well. By 9:20 the sky was clearing, so I started setting up the 18" dob.

I finished by about 9:35, at which point it completely clouded over. Figures! I spent the next hour picking things out through holes in the clouds. There seemed to be lots of holes forming around the Ring Nebula, so lots of people got to see that. At times there just weren't any showcase objects visible, so I branched out with the help of Starmap Pro on my iPhone. I went to M12 at one point as the best I could find, which went over ok, but didn't evoke the "wow!" reaction.

Around 10:40, the sky cleared. I went right to M13, and people of course went nuts over it. Then we hit the Swan Nebula, Dumbbell Nebula, and Wild Ducks. The crowd ate it up. 11pm came quick, so I had to pack it up and leave after a quick view of Jupiter. The sky was fairly unstable all night, so none of the views were particularly crisp.

One group of "civilians" brought a dob that looked to be about 10", and they seemed to find at least a couple of things. As I was packing up, they asked me to come identify a nebula they'd found which turned out to be the Swan. It was a nice view, so hopefully they'll continue to use that scope.

It was a good crowd of mostly youngish families and lots of children. There were many good questions, plus the typical "how much does that cost?" sorts of questions. The other Mike and I were the only CHAOS members present. Between our scopes and the scopes that the Morehead folks brought, there seemed to be enough to keep the crowd entertained. Of those people who stayed until the end, I think most were quite satisfied. Many people left during the cloudy portion though, but I think a lot of them got to at least see something early on.

It is worth noting that the clear sky chart predicted no clouds at all for 12 hours before and after this event. Sometimes it can be spot-on, and other times it's just flat wrong.

Medoc July 24

I was glued to the sky chart until the afternoon update, which showed an unusually clear summer evening. Within an hour, I had plans to meet Allen Davis at Medoc! This was my first trip to Medoc after having heard so much.

I arrived at 8pm. Allen was there with his friend Don, and Sims Roy was also there. The sky was clear all night, but it was quite humid. Very early on, things got wet. None the less, the observing was great fun. All night long, the views were consistently much better than we expected given the humidity. The sky got darker as the night went on, with midnight being much darker than 10-11pm. By 3am it was a bit darker still. Our limiting magnitude was at least 5.2.

We had quite a few people from the campground stop by. We showed them the usual tourist traps, which were well-received. Two boys in high school ended up staying out with us very late (1 or 2 am) and had a great time. They got to see what observing is really about and look at lots of different objects.

I started with some usual suspects:

M13- high overhead, and looking beautiful! A young boy described it as "fireworks that were frozen".
M5- also spectacular. Lots of stars resolving nicely.
Ring Nebula- Wonderful as always. This was a big hit.
Whirlpool Galaxy- this is where the humidity began to show. The two galaxy cores were very bright and obvious. The arms were easy to spot, but the view wasn't terribly clear.
Pinwheel Galaxy- more challenging. The arms were difficult to spot without moving the scope back and forth a bit.
Veil Nebula- Decent, but not nearly as much detail as I saw at MASP. The middle section was unusually hard to find given how dark it was.
Swan Nebula- Very good with lots of detail, especially around the bottom of the check. The OIII filter didn't help as much as I am used to. At 205x with the OIII, I couldn't see a lot of the peripheral nebulosity that I know is there.
Wild Ducks- Pristine! The star field looked really sharp. This is one of my favorites.
Dumbbell Nebula- Very bright, with the outer ellipse well-defined. Beautiful, ghostly look. This one appeared a bit more orange than other nebulas.
NGC 6217- small, faint galaxy with a round disk and relatively bright core.
M56- Understated globular cluster in Lyra, only a few stars resolving near the core at 293x.
NGC 7331- Brightest galaxy in Pegasus, but very faint on this evening. I couldn't make out any companions.
Andromeda Galaxy- Very nice with its companions. I could see just the one major dust lane as a hard edge on one side.
Jupiter- Pushed this all the way up to 584x, and the image stayed ok. It had moments of clarity that came and went. Probably the best view was around 410x. We could see a lot of detail in the cloud bands. Try as we may, we could not make out the impact point that was spotted recently. We had enough clarity that I think we would have seen it if it were still visible.

At one point, I heard Allen and the two boys talking about how great the Andromeda Galaxy looked through binoculars. I went over, and Allen handed me a smallish pair that he said were 12x36. Then he said "when you get it in view, just push this button on top". Huh? It turns out that these were image-stabilized binoculars made by Canon. I got Andromeda into the field of view with the usual shakes from hand-holding, and then I pushed the magic button. WHOA! The whole image went from quite jittery to just slowly floating around.

This really felt like magic, and it takes binocular astronomy to a completely different level. You can just walk outside, point your binoculars up, and enjoy the kind of stability that you would expect out of a quality mount. Amazing! I'm sure this is perfect for travel, or for a cold night when you just want to step outside to see something and then dart right back in. This technology adds tremendous value to the experience of binocular astronomy. Too bad they are so expensive! (currently $550 on Amazon, or $900 for 15x50s).

Oh, and Andromeda looked stunning through the binos. I also picked out M13, the Swan Nebula, and the Lagoon Nebula. For someone who does binocular astronomy a fair amount, I think the IS feature would be well worth the price. It also seems to be a fair trade-off to go down in aperture a bit in exchange for having a stable image.

Allen and I decided to pack up around 4am. The observing was still good, but it was getting very wet, and we were both starting to feel tired. It was a very fun evening, and the conditions were about as good as one can expect for July.

Pettigrew Day 2

Pettigrew State Park has been wonderful. The rangers and staff have made us feel like we own the place. They recognize that dark sky is one of their most valuable natural resources, and they are specifically interested in supporting astronomy and making a name for their park as an astronomy destination.

In the afternoon, Robert and I went in search of carnivorous plants on the south side of Lake Phelps. We managed to find the underwater type, but none of the "Sundew" plants that are so popular. The land south of the lake is incredibly devoid of anything man-made. In places, you can see for what seems like miles. Check here for pictures of the park and our setup.

As it was getting dark, some campers and a local who lives across the street joined us to look through the scopes. We gave a tour of the Moon, Orion Nebula, Saturn, M46, etc. At about 8:50, we spotted the International Space Station. Robert followed it with his binoculars, and I tracked it in my scope. I used a Panoptic 35mm, giving me 59x. I had no problem following it, but it seemed like a fair amount of time went by without much structural detail being visible. Eventually I saw the solar panels on each side, which seemed to be almost edge-on. I suppose that makes sense if they wanted the panels aimed at the Sun. I could also at that point distinguish at least one cylindrical module in the center.

The Moon did not set until around midnight, and although it was only three days past new, it was incredibly bright. While we waited, Robert got his portable coffee machine setup. The forecast was for a low in the upper 30s, so it was great to have some warmth and extra energy.

9:40pm We can hear red wolves howling. The rangers said there is a den about a mile and a half down the shore to the West. Most of the howling comes from that direction, but some is further North.

Once the moon set, the sky was incredible. Everything was very still and very dark. Note that nearly all of my galaxy observing was done at either 121x or 205x. Here comes the observing list:

54 Leonis: very nice double star- a bright yellow one with a much smaller blue companion
M105: Part of a beautiful galaxy trio including NGC 3384 and the fainter NGC 3389
NGC 3377: Bright, distinct core with a glowing halo. Makes a nice view at 121x with NGC 3367, which did not have an obvious core
Leo Triplet: Stunning trio of galaxies! M65 appears mostly edge-on with a dust lane above the core. M66 appears more face-on with a bright bar across its core. NGC 3628 appears edge-on with a serious dust lane like the Sombrero.
NGC 3607/3608: Two small galaxies that have obvious cores and seem face-on. Like two eyes looking back at you from space! 3607 is slightly brighter and larger.
NGC 3507: very faint edge-on galaxy with a dust lane on the South side
NGC 3226/3227: These interacting galaxies are beautiful, like a pair of breasts in the sky. 3227 is slightly brighter overall but has a smaller core. NGC 3222 is also visible, but faint.
NGC 3245: bright core and halo, very faint extremities at 205x.
NGC 3414/3418: Nice pair of galaxies that apparently didn't merit further description in my notes.
NGC 3504: Great framing of this galaxy inside a triangle of fairly bright stars. A very dull circle was visible around the galaxy, which I now know are two giant spiral arms.
NGC 3432: This is a bright edge-on galaxy that seemed thicker on the West end. I pushed this one to 293x.
NGC 3319: extremely faint galaxy
NGC 3198: large, even halo with a subtle core
NGC 3079: Edge-on galaxy with two dust lanes visible near the core. They seem to form a V shape with the core in the center.
NGC 3184: very faint and expansive galaxy with an obvious core
NGC 3198: faint and long galaxy, mostly edge-on, with no obvious core.
NGC 3726: small core, not quite face-on, with spiral structure evident.
NGC 3877: edge-on galaxy with a big core
NGC 3394/3396: bright pair of interacting galaxies, but I cannot see actual contact. NGC 3424 also appears in the view.
M104 (Sombrero): freakishly good, even at 410x!
Copeland's Septet: This is a very small collection, but at 205x, all seven were plainly visible.

It is now nearing 4am, and I've had two cups of coffee. I almost never drink coffee, but when I do, it has quite an effect!

M13: as incredible as last night. I went to 293x and lost no detail or sharpness.
M92: the other beautiful globular in Hercules, smaller than M13, but still stunning
M5: a spectacular globular which I've always thought is very blue. This globular has less density once you get outside the core than M13 or M92.
M11 (Wild Ducks): Wow! The star field is so dense, it's incredible. It was difficult at first to see where the triangular shape was amid so many other stars.

It is now about 4:30am. I am enjoying another cup of coffee and have committed to observing the rest of the night. Robert is shutting down and preparing for sleep. The rest of my observing session can only be described as a glorious victory march through great Summer objects. I had my Pocket Sky Atlas in hand, a crazy grin on my face, and just browsed the charts for my favorite clusters and nebulae. I was too loopy to plan the rest of my session, due to being tired, really excited, and highly caffeinated.

M17 (Swan): WHOA!!! I saw as much detail in my 8x50 finder as I sometimes see in my scope.  I am not exaggerating!  Then I put an OIII filter on it (the scope, not the finder), and it was mind-blowing. This is at 121x. I then tried a UHC filter, and I was surprised to see it improve some aspects of the view. Until now, I've always preferred the OIII to UHC in side-by-side comparisons. Some of the detail under the swan's wing was less prominent with the UHC, but everything else was brighter.
M8 (Lagoon): All I wrote in my notes was "Life changing."
M20 (Trifid): Insane! The dark veins on the inside were very clear. The nebulosity outside the main disk was also very prominent and bright. If you have the Night Sky Observer's Guide Volume 2, the view was much better than the picture on p. 316. I'd say it looked about 90% as good as this.
M27 (Dumbbell): All I wrote was "Perfect." You could not ask for more detail.
Jupiter: I caught this planet rising in the east, still very low. Its leading edge looked very blue, and the trailing edge very orange.
M28: A smallish globular in Sagittarius.

5:40am "Is the sky to the East a touch brighter than it was a few minutes ago?"

M22: Wow! This globular rivals M3 and M5.

5:46am - Game Over.

As with the first night, there were numerous objects (mostly faint galaxies) that I did not make notes on because they didn't distinguish themselves from the crowd.

Can you tell I had fun? These two nights were really a blast, and I can't wait for my next chance to get to Pettigrew. It's a beautiful place, the facilities cover all of the basic needs, the rangers and staff were very good to us, and of course the dark sky is just incredible.