If you get out tonight or the next couple of nights and look West at Sunset, you will see 5 planets in a relatively close alignment. Mercury will be low and close to the horizon. Next and higher up will be Venus, Mars and Saturn. Also the Moon will be passing below the planets each night.

To best appreciate this, you’ll need to find yourself a high location with a clear view to the West. Our alternate observing location on Tyneside Rd is a good candidate location since the farm across the road has few obstructions. You won’t need any gear to see these.

These planets are not really close enough to be considered a conjunction, but they do make a nice alignment and wide field view.

Here’s a chart from SpaceWeather.com showing the position of the planets and the Moon for the 15th (except for the Moon, it’s valid for nights before and after the 15th).

The 5th planet? Your standing on it of course!

I have in the past, like many of you, observed Venus in the daytime. It is certainly bright enough to shine through the twilight, and even the bright blue sky of day, if you know where to look. On one occasion, during the great Mars opposition of 2003, I followed the planet from darkness through dawn and after sunrise in my telescope. Mars showed excellent detail through the scope, even after the sun had come up.

This morning, Jupiter is 10 degrees from the Moon, and at this time of day (9:00am) it appears almost directly below the Moon. I though I would try to spot it with my binoculars, thinking that I could use the Moon as a guide. Starting at the Moon, I lowered my binoculars down, sweeping vertically, hoping to spot Jupiter. On the fourth attempt I was successful. It was very difficult to spot, but once I saw it, it stood out clearly, showing a pale white against the blue sky. Through the binoculars I could clearly make out the small disk of the planet. At this time, the Sun was a full 30 degrees above the horizon!

It’s an odd, but interesting observation. Try the unusual, and look for a daytime pairing like this. One will happen again the next time the Moon slides past Jupiter (July 31st, 7 degrees separation), or try to spot Venus in the daytime. Remember, when observing during the day, always be very careful to not look anywhere near the Sun.

John G and I arrived early to open the park. The gates were still open when we got there, so we checked in with the park staff, to let them know we where there. We then went to the hill, set up our scopes and took a few photos of the sunset. We went back to the gate at 9:20 to unlock the gate and put on the combination lock. Joe M. and Vince where there waiting to get in. We all returned to the hill to get ready for the night. In all 9 members turned out to the park to observe and compare views. Kevin kept us all hopping, keeping up to him, star hopping from Messier to NGC. and back to Messier. Well done Kevin. The moon was starting to rise above the trees by 1:00am when we decided to pack up for the night. We where all tired and didn’t even go to Tim’s for the usual coffee and conversation. All in all a great night.

From John G.

Sure was a great night, and I was so glad to see so many club members out there. Jim described the evening well, and even though the sky conditions weren’t the best, I still had great views through everyone’s scopes. Globular clusters were popular, and seeing so many in such a short period of time gave us an interesting opportunity to compare them. Each one is unique and has its own character. Kevin’s new dob is a great scope, and he was swinging it around the sky with the skill of a master starhopper. One of the best views of the night came through Vince’s binoviewer. It was so comfortable to use, and the view was 3-D like (yes, I know it’s only an illusion!) Thanks to Jim, Kevin, Ed, Matthew, Gordon, Joe and Vince for the views! Now, I didn’t get any astrophotos, but here’s that sunset that Jim mentioned.

Canada Day indeed!

I plan to go to McQueston Park tonight for a few hours and I was wondering if there was any interest. I plan to get there for about 9.

This was our second trip to Cherry Springs. Last year was pretty much a wash out. This year gave us two evenings of observing. I used thursday night to add to my list of M’s and Ngc’s and had a lot of success. The seeing was very good. The next night, the seeing was excellent, the best I’ve ever experienced with a scope at hand. Janice and I saw amazing detail in many objects. I think the whirlpool was my favourite with NGC 4565 a close second. We all stayed up till about 3:15 am finishing off with views of Jupiter and Uranus. It’s the first time I’ve seen Uranus as a blue disk. Actually, there were too many firsts for me to mention. I’d like to thank Ann and Steve for helping to collimate my scope to it’s best ever and the resolution after that was incredible. We had a great time and enjoyed the commeraderie of our fellow members and Jim’s hospitality. It was a blast!

A total of eleven HAA members travelled to Cherry Springs State Park in Pennsylvania to attend the Astronomical Society of Harrisburg, PA’s annual star party. Because I had to come home early, I promised to post this quick note on the blog. I hope that others will add to it and post some photos.

Both Thursday and Friday nights were clear, but Friday night was spectacular! The best skies I’ve seen at CSSP. The dark lanes and star clouds of the Milky Way were crisp and extended all the way to the horizon. Familiar deep sky objects popped out of the eyepiece of even the smallest telescopes. John and I were amazed at what we could see with our little 80 mm refractors: the North America nebula and the Veil nebula.

I had the best view ever of the Whirlpool Galaxy (M51) through Matthew’s 12″ Skywatcher and his new 13mm Ethos eyepiece. The detail visible in this galaxy was astonishing.

The forecast for this evening at CSSP is not looking too good, but last night’s forecast was for “mainly cloudy” and we had fabulous clear skies, so I hope for a repeat performance tonight for everyone still enjoying the star party.

Cheers,

Ann Tekatch

Hey gang,

I actually set my alarm clock for this very early in the morning on June 8th. It’s a 19min (1min subs) shot of Comet 2009 R1 McNaught and NGC891… it certainly took way more than 19 min to process though! Yikes! Deep Sky Stacker has a routine to stack the comet with no star trailing but unfortunately it wasn’t working for me. So I had to do it manually by running it so that it would stack just on the stars (so comet was blurred and NGC891 was sharp) and then again where it was stacking on the comet (stars were trailed). I blended both images in PS in lighten mode to get this final result. Hope you like it or at least find it interesting 🙂

McNaught, I believe is around mag 6.7 and still getting brighter.

The image below is almost a full frame taken with the QHY-8 and 8in RC (1625mm fl) so the comet is not that small.

http://www.weatherandsky.com/main.php?g2_view=core.DownloadItem&g2_itemId=7946

KerryLH

It’s been cloudy for the past few days. But now we’re expecting a couple of clear nights. It will be a good time to get out and look for Mars as it passes the bright blue star Regulus in the constellation Leo.

The closest pairing, as identified in the 2010 HAA Calendar, was Sunday night (June 6), but Mars will still be close for the next few evenings. Here’s a sky chart showing the position of Mars in the Western sky.

And of course Saturn is nicely positioned nearby for another wonderful view. In a few months, Saturn won’t be positioned as conveniently or as high in the sky so now is the best time to enjoy it.

On Fri June 11, 1 hour after sunset, Venus will be in a straight line with the 2 main stars of Gemini – Pollux and Castor. This will be a pretty sight and photo opportunity. Find yourself a good clear view to the West without city light glow if possible.

If you’re an asteroid watcher, Ceres is approaching opposition (occurs on June 18) which is when this object is closest to Earth and easiest to see. It’s travelling through the constellation Sagittarius towards Ophiuchus.

Path of Ceres leading up to opposition.

It’s a faint object (mag 7.3), but one that most amateur telescopes 3″ and larger can detect. Even a good pair of binoculars are capable of spotting this asteroid when it’s this close. It will be interesting to see it change position each night. Just carefully observe the target star field and keep an image in your mind (or better is to sketch it). Then see what changes each night as you go back to the same area.

For the early morning observer, Jupiter is nicely positioned (with Uranus nearby). There was another asteroid impact on Jupiter recently (June 3). There are some videos of the flash from the impact over on Spaceweather.com.

So far no one has seen a dark spot resulting from the impact, but you may be the first to detect it. The recent impact, the one from last year, and the detection that Jupiter lost it’s South Equatorial Band (SEB) was all first discovered by amateurs just like you – so you have just as much a chance of spotting the debris field as any one does. Don’t forget us when you achieve international fame for your discovery!

A reminder that the Cherry Springs Star Party is coming up later this week. There are a few spots left. Today is the last full day for online registration if you’re thinking about going. At $40USD, it’s a good deal. A number of the HAA membership will be there. It’s always a good event with lots of interesting speakers and a great location.

And be sure to check out the latest edition of our newsletter Event Horizon which is now online, for more things that will be coming up over the summer months.

Clear skies!

(images courtesy of Spaceweather.com and Skyandtelescope.com)

If you’re not going out to watch fireworks, then I invite you to join some others at our alternate observing location on Tyneside Rd. I’ll be heading out for about 9-9:30pm.

The skies will be clear though the gibbous moon will be fairly bright. We may get lucky and see some sporadic meteors which will be our own private fireworks show. Plus with Venus, Saturn and all the other wonderful items in the night sky, who needs fireworks?

Since some have school or work tomorrow, we probably won’t stay too late. But even few hours of observing will be fun.

(Wednesday, May 19)
Several club members are taking their telescopes to Hamilton’s McQueston Park to do some sidewalk astronomy tonight. We’ll probably arrive 8:30-9:00 and stay for a couple of hours. McQueston Park is on Upper Wentworth Street, just south of the Lincoln Alexander Parkway, on the east side of the street. Join us if you can.

Update:
There were 6 of us at McQueston Park tonight: Jim, Joe, Kevin & Ed, Me and Don. Together we showed the wonders of the Moon, Venus, Saturn, Mars and assorted stars to about a gazillion kids and their families. Many of them had never looked through a telescope before and there were far too many “Galileo Moments” to count! A very satisfying, but exhausting, evening for us.