Jane Houston Jones » Astro adventures and star tails

Spring stargazing: the Milky Way and beyond!

jane — Tue, 09 Apr 2013 22:56:35 +0000

Follow the dipper arc to Arcturus, then spike to Spica

Omega Centauri globular cluster 35 degrees below Spica

Springtime is my favorite observing season. In the course of an evening you can face away from our own galaxy and feast your eyes on other Milky Ways, while tracking down some of the most spectacular objects tangled among the stars and dust of our own galaxy.

Omega Centauri is one of them. It’s the largest of the 150+ globular clusters discovered in our own Milky Way Galaxy. There may be even more undiscovered globular clusters hidden behind the gas and dust of our galaxy. Omega Centauri was discovered by Edmund Halley in 1677 as a nebula, but it had been listed in Ptolemy’s catalog 2000 years ago as a star! It’s located about 15,800 light-years from Earth and contains several million Population II stars. The stars in its center are so crowded that they are estimated to average only 0.1 light years away from each other. It is about 12 billion years old, and there is some speculation that Omega Centauri may be the core of a dwarf galaxy which was disrupted, destroyed and absorbed in an encounter with the Milky Way.

This spectacular object is well known to southern hemisphere observers, but it may come as a surprise that it can be seen from many northern hemisphere locations as well. If you are south of the 25th parallel or 25° (degrees) North latitude you should be able to see it 20° above the horizon, and located 35° below Virgo’s great blue-white star, Spica. I’ve observed it from 37° North (Lake Sonoma, CA) several times (from a hill with a negative horizon) and at 33° N in this writeup, where it appeared less than 20° above the horizon definitely! It’s been seen from 42° North as well, from a very flat horizon. It’s a naked eye object, but often the horizon is hazy, so scan with binoculars if you don’t see it with your eyes.

NGC 5128, Centaurus A Galaxy, and NGC 5139 Omega Centauri, the largest Globular Cluster in our Milky Way

To find Omega Centauri, you’ll first have to find Spica, the brightest star in Virgo. It helps right now that golden Saturn is near by. To find Spica, continue the curve of the big dipper handle and “arc to Arcturus, and then spike to Spica”. Spica transits — when it reaches its highest point in the sky — at around midnight daylight saving time. Use this table of transit times for major solar system objects and bright stars and select your observing dates, object (Spica in this case) and your location and press “compute”. “Alt” next to the transit time at your location indicates Spica’s altitude above the horizon. Spica and Omega Centauri transit at the same time, so look about 35° (one clenched fist is 10°) directly below Spica to look for an oval hazy cluster the size of the full moon. Can you see individual stars? Does it look round or oval? Try with your eyes, then with binoculars.

After confirming my view of Omega Centauri and making this little sketch (sketch view as seen through my binoculars), I opened my Herald Bobroff AstroAtlas to the Centaurus constellation pages and looked at what else was in the vicinity of Omega Centauri. I remembered a favorite galaxy, NGC5128, officially named Centaurus A, but nicknamed the hamburger galaxy for obvious reasons. Now I’ve seen both of these objects from Australian skies where they are not hugging the horizon. But even through a partially cloudy horizon, I was able to see this fabulous object, with its dark dust lane bisecting the oval galaxy.

NGC5128 is one of the closest radio galaxies to Earth, so its active galactic nucleus has been extensively studied by professional astronomers, and a supernova was detected in the galaxy’s dust lane in 1986. The Spitzer Space Telescope studies have confirmed that Centaurus A is colliding with and devouring a smaller spiral galaxy! Centaurus A is located approximately 4° north of Omega Centauri, and because the galaxy has a high surface brightness and relatively large angular size (2/3 the apparent size of Omega Centauri), it’s visible to the naked eye under good conditions. My sketch was made with difficulty, by aiming my 14.5-inch reflector (with a 10mm Radian eyepiece for 200x) nearly horizontal and half-perched uncomfortably on the bottom step of my observing ladder.

M68 cluster in Hydra, NGC2903 Galaxy in Leo

Before moving on, I observed another object in the southern sky line between Spica and Omega Centauri, Globular Cluster M68, or NGC4590 in the constellation Hydra. I sketched an oval glow of stars within a diffuse squarish haze of fainter stars.

Now it was time to get vertical and observe some other objects higher in the sky. The beautiful constellation Leo was still well placed in the southwest sky after midnight. I opened my Night Sky Observer’s Guide Volume 2, the Spring and Summer volume to Leo. Gamma Leonis, or Algeiba, is a beautiful deep yellow/orange and pale yellow double star in the sickle (or backwards question mark or lion’s mane) of Leo’s head. Next, I moved to a fascinating red dwarf, Wolf 359, near the famous Leo galaxies M95, M96 and the Leo “trio” of galaxies. Wolf 359 moves 4.71″ (arcseconds) per year or 8′(arcminutes) in a century. It’s the third closest star to the sun, at 7.75 light years away. Only Alpha Centauri and Barnard’s Star are closer. At magnitude 13.6 (similar to Pluto’s magnitude) it’s faint, but the striking red color helps distinguish it from the other nearby stars.

Leo 1 near Regulas, Leo’s heart was my next target. A faint dwarf galaxy overshadowed by bright Regulus is a member of the local group of galaxies, and may be one of the most distant satellites of the Milky Way. Faint NGC2903 — a very pretty magnitude 9 barred spiral galaxy tangled in the starry lion’s mane was worth a sketch. It’s 31 million light years away, local but not attached to any local galaxy group. I had to go and have a look at the supernova in Leo’s M65 galaxy – here is Mojo’s animation of M65,combining two images of M65, one shot on 3/9/13 at Amboy Crater, and one shot on 4/6/13 at Chuckwalla Bench located at N 33° 39′ 37″, W 115° 32′ 26″

Comet C/2011 L4 (PANSTARRS) shot before dawn on 4/7/13, five-minute exposure

It dawned on me I hadn’t observed Saturn yet. Under fabulous steady skies, I was able to pump up the magnification of my 15-inch Litebox reflector to over 300x using a 6mm Televue Radian eyepiece. When I say “my” 14.5-inch Litebox, I mean Mojo’s — I have a 12.5-inch and 17.5-inch version of these fabulous time machines. This image taken by Anthony Wesley the same night shows Saturn as I viewed it. My visual view was not quite this vivid, but the contrast of the colors is very similar to what I saw, including the dark north polar region, so famous in the Cassini North Polar Hexagon images. The distinct band colors and darker north polar area I saw and sketched were varying shades of butterscotch and chocolate.

All that was left now was Comet PanSTARRS, and we had to wait until about 4:00 a.m. for Andromeda to rise in the northeastern sky. I observed it in my 7×50 Carton Adlerblick binoculars quickly and then pooped out and went to sleep until well after dawn. Mojo stayed up and took this lovely image, plus several more including a time sequence showing the comet’s motion. It’s really worth a look and a read and here’s the link. Until next dark sky observing night on May 11, I’m signing off!

Mojo’s images and report from the same night

My first view of Comet PanSTARRS 3/11/13

jane — Tue, 12 Mar 2013 09:33:58 +0000

Sunday morning (Sunday March 10) we drove home from a wonderful Amboy Crater observing night. As we drove up our street, we have a good view of Mt. Wilson and the telescopes, as you can see here. My Comet PanSTARRS sketches (and astrophotos tomorrow) from near the Mt. Wilson Observatory (but on the other side of the mountain) are below.

Mt. Wilson 100 & 60-inch telescope domes and solar telescopes from home

I drove past the telescopes on Angeles Crest Highway 2 to catch a glimpse of the comet. From home, Mt. Wilson is about 7 miles away as the crow flies. Not being a crow, I drove 13 miles to work, then 3 miles to Angeles Crest Freeway, then up 20+ miles and 5,200 feet in elevation on the mountain highway to get this view — that’s the historic 100-inch Mt Wilson Hooker telescope dome and the two solar telescopes on the ridge.

Passing Mt. Wilson telescopes from Angeles Crest Highway

We arrived at our viewing location, 23.5 miles up the hill, milepost 48.34, 34d 18′ 26″ N Latitude 118d 00’54″ W Longitude, altitude 5266 ft before sunset – the Chileo turnout just before the Caltrans yard on Angeles Crest Highway. I am indebted to my friend Steve Edberg, who has observed on these pullouts since the 1970′s. We passed many other spots which he has observed from, but which didn’t have the required “dip” in altitude, which provided a view of the western horizon depressed to a further 1 degree.

Sunset (and green flash) at my comet viewing spot on Angeles Crest Highway

We had to wait over a half hour after sunset for the twilight sky to darken. Civil twilight occurred at 7:22 p.m. PDT, when the sun dipped 6 degrees below the horizon. We scanned the sky, not only looking for the comet, but for the moon, too. But the new moon was only about 6 hours old (new at 12:52 p.m. Pacific Daylight Time March 11, and impossible to see). Thanks to Steve Edberg for explaining “horizon depression”:”Due to our elevation, looking down from 5,266 feet, the terrain horizon in the distance was lower than horizontal, so we could look “down” far enough that we gained one degree more of viewing potential. This dip of the horizon doesn’t include the terrestrial refraction at the apparent horizon, which often “raises” astronomical objects (meaning they set later than airless geometry predicts)”.

Here is what we did see, beginning at 7:34 p.m.

Here is my first sketch. Showing what Comet PanSTARRS looks like through 7 x 50 binoculars with a 7 degree field of view. We were unable to see it naked-eye. I couldn’t get both the horizon and the comet in the same binocular field of view.

Sketches show my binocular view - this is what Comet PanSTARRS looked like through binoculars

Here is the final view through bigger binoculars just before the comet was lost in the haze. Celestron 9 x 63 binos, with a 5 degree field of view. It was amazing to watch the speedy comet move!

Last views of Comet PanSTARRS (on first observation)

NASA’s Prime Time for PANSTARRS Toolkit with charts, and observations and more.

What’s Up PanSTARR Edition Podcast

Kemble’s Cascade: the joy of observing with binoculars

jane — Mon, 11 Mar 2013 07:06:40 +0000

Start your night with binoculars

Here’s Mojo’s atrophotography post from the same evening.

After some months away from dark skies, everything looks foreign, even to long time observers like me. I recognize the familiar constellations, but sometimes I forget where some of my favorite telescopic targets are located. On nights like this, I don’t just revisit the same old objects with my telescope. I sit down and scan the sky — from horizon to horizon — with my binoculars, until a stargazing project presents itself to me.

There are a lot of binoculars out there. When I was beginning my amateur astronomy hobby 25 years ago, I bought a pair of Carton Adlerblick 7 X 50 (7 times magnified) binoculars. I still use them, though I do have more powerful binos, which weigh more, which is why I rarely use them. These Adlerblicks are my go-to binoculars. They are lightweight and are great for both terrestrial and celestial viewing.

So, on some dark sky nights, I start my observing session by scanning the sky with my binoculars, and hope to find an object or theme of objects to observe. I end up with an old favorite in the binocular view pretty quickly almost every time.

Sky Map Pro sky chart crop showing Kemble's Cascade with the location of NGC 1502, 1501 and IC 342 shown

Kemble's Cascade, sketched from 7 x 50 binocular view

That happened last night (March 9, 2013), as I scanned the northern constellations from Amboy Crater, our current favorite dark sky site. All of a sudden, my entire binocular field of view was bisected by a line of bright stars, Kemble’s Cascade, an old favorite of mine! This is one of the joys of visual observing. I love to scan the sky with binoculars, then dig a little deeper to see what is in the neighborhood using my star charts. After years of observing “lists” of projects, I really enjoy just letting my binoculars be my guide to a night of stargazing.

Kemble’s Cascade is a nearly straight line of stars as long as 5 full moons lined up side by side. It completely spanned my binocular field of view. Kemble’s Cascade is one of the finest binocular objects in the winter sky, but is located in one of the most difficult constellations to actually see: Camelopardalis, the camel leopard (or the Giraffe). It’s located near Polaris, between and above Cassiopeia and Perseus. Quick hint: I aim my binoculars at the Perseus Double cluster, and scan up from there until I find it. This asterism (not a constellation, but a group of stars forming some shape) was named after Father Lucian J. Kemble, an amateur astronomer from Canada who first saw this cascade of faint stars.

I took out my sketch notebook and sketched this view from my binoculars. Now my evening stargazing project had a start. After I made this sketch, I opened my Night Sky Observer’s Guide (NSOG) to the constellation Camelopardalis to remind myself what else was in the neighborhood. This two (three, actually – the third being southern skies) book series is organized by constellation with one book for summer and spring constellations, and another volume for autumn and winter. It’s my go-to observing book. I can open it to any constellation and find a wonderful starhopping project for the night.

Camelopardalis is a northern circumpolar constellation. Find Polaris, the North Star and you are in the celestial neighborhood of the camel-leopard, or Giraffe constellation.

One of the finder charts in the chapter on Camelopardalis showed several objects near the Kemble’s Cascade line of stars – a star cluster, a planetary nebula and a galaxy. I hadn’t looked at these for a while – two are on William Herschel’s small project list, the Herschel 400, which I observed many years ago. So I settled in for a pleasant hour of starhopping. Through the telescope, only a few of the stars of Kemble’s Cascade filled each eyepiece view. So first I just rode along the cascade, star by star. The first of the deep sky objects soon was in my eyepiece.

Open Cluster NGC 1502

Planetary Nebula NGC 1501

Face-on spiral galaxy IC 342

NGC 1502 – The New General Catalogue of Nebulae and Clusters of Stars (NGC) is a well-known catalogue of deep sky objects compiled by Dreyer in 1888, as a new version of John Herschel’s Catalogue of Nebulae and Clusters of Stars. NGC 1502 is a stunning open cluster near the south end of Kemble’s Cascade, 2,680 light-years away, and estimated to be only 11.2 million years old. Once you memorize where to find the Cascade (I can see this cluster naked eye from our dark sky observing spots, and use it to find Kemble’s Cascade), you have a second easy-to-find, and crowd pleasing object to share with others. The cluster is rich with bright stars, shines at magnitude 5.7, making it naked-eye visible from a dark sky. It will remind experienced stargazers of the ET Cluster, NGC 457 in nearby Cassiopeia. (At least it reminds me of that nearby cluster)! They both have two prominent non-human “eyes” comprised of brighter stars. Take some time looking at this cluster, and find the pretty blue and gold double star embedded in it.

NGC 1501 is a bright planetary nebula with a blue color visible from a dark sky, glowing at magnitude 11.5, located 4,900 light-years distant. Though it’s not naked eye visible, it’s easy to find in a moderate-sized (6-12 inch) telescope. It will remind experienced observers of the Eskimo nebula in Gemini. If your sky conditions allow, view this nebula at high power – I used a 9mm eyepiece on my 12.5 inch f/5.75 reflector for a magnification of 202X. At this power I was able to see the faint blue color, dark and light markings, and see that it was wider in the middle. 8-10 inch telescopes will show this detail at high power from a dark sky.

IC 342 (IC stands for Index Catalogue, one of two supplements to the NGC. The first was published in 1895 and contained 1,520 objects, while the second was published in 1908 and contained 3,866 objects, for a total of 5,386 IC objects). IC 342 is a spiral galaxy seen face-on. The nucleus is bright and the spiral arms are visible in a dark sky through moderate sized telescopes such as my 12.5 inch reflector. The magnitude is an easy 9.1 — easy through a telescope, not naked-eye visible. It is 6.5 million light years away. On the SW side of the galaxy, a string of foreground Milky Way stars – 6 stars in a straight line – are easy to see. IC 342 is one of the brightest two galaxies in the IC 342/Maffei Group of galaxies, one of the galaxy groups that is closest to our Local Group. In 1935, Harlow Shapley declared that this galaxy was the third largest spiral galaxy by angular size then known, smaller only than the Andromeda Galaxy (M31) and the Triangulum Galaxy (M33), being wider that the full moon. (Modern estimates are more conservative, giving the apparent size as one-half to two-thirds the diameter of the full moon). It is almost hidden from view behind the veil of stars, gas and dust clouds in the plane of our Milky Way galaxy!

Don’t be afraid to scan the sky with binoculars, even if you don’t know where you are looking or what to do you once you see something interesting. Ask a nearby astronomer, and in many cases, she will be able to aim her telescope at your new binocular discovery. It’s a great way to start your stargazing hobby!

What’s Up in 2013 at a glance

jane — Mon, 07 Jan 2013 18:29:31 +0000

All year long, astronomers have been writing about Comet ISON: will it sizzle or will it fizzle? Both! Here’s my What’s Up video, with December status (written in mid November, but luckily, the comet didn’t completely fizzle)

ISON in December 2013

Comet ISON first spotted by amateur astronomer Bruce Gary and has been imaged by many eagle-eyed observers with good astrophotography equipment since mid August. A selection of images and data are shown here. I’ll update this frequently as more is understood about Comet ISON. Meanwhile, here is a wesbite with current Comet ISON magnitude and location which is constantly updated!

Comet ISON survived its close pass of the sun on November 28. Scientists are unsure what is actually left of the comet. A fragmented nucleus? Nothing but orbiting dust? Stay tuned!

Here’s an excellent Star Chart showing Comet ISON’s path in November, courtesy of Skyhound’s Skytools3 software. (These are the charts I use for my own deep sky observing.) The chart has not been updated for December as of November 30th.

Latest visible comet news here.

December 2013

You may have noticed a very bright ‘star’ in the western sky. That’s Venus! Venus shines at its very brightest, magnitude -4.9 this month. It sets about three hours after sunset at the beginning of the month and one and a half hours after sunset at the end of the month. This is a great month to view the dramatic changes in the apparent diameter and phases of Venus as it races towards its conjunction with the sun. The first observations of the phases of Venus were made by Galileo in 1610!

Mars continues to grow brighter and rises near midnight, and Jupiter rises earlier in the evening, heralding the best viewing season for Jupiter watchers.

The beautiful Geminid meteor shower will only slightly be marred by moonlight on the night of December 13 and 14. The radiant lies near Gemini with brilliant Jupiter above and the constellation Orion below. From a dark sky, but even from the city, the mighty hunter Orion is easily visible in the southeast sky. Take a look at Orion’s shoulder star, red Betelgeuse and its knee star, blue Rigel and the Orion Nebula.southwestern horizon.

The Milky Way and all the visible planets and comets should encourage stargazers to escape the city lights this month. Join me in the California Desert November 30, at MOjave National Preserve. We have no chance to See ISON for another week, but there are other nice comets, planets, stars, and dark sky objects too enjoy from dusk to dawn.

The times to look will be just after dusk, low to the horizon at sunset, and higher at dawn for northern latitudes the first half of the month. On December 1, look for a pretty diagonal lineup of the comet, Mercury and the crescent moon just before sunrise in the southeast. Then for the second half of the month, the comet becomes circumpolar. It will appear near the constellation Draco on December 26th, when it is half an a.u. (0.42 a.u.to be exact) from Earth. Will the comets’ tail span a quarter of the sky? I’ll update this as more info is available.

Jupiter reaches opposition January 4th, 2014, and rises earlier in the evening. Venus bright as it ever gets – a whopping magnitude -4.9. It will be a fabulous view – a particularly good astrophoto and sketching target as it grows in diameter, but shrinks in phase. Mars increases in brightness and rises earlier (after midnight). Mars will be a great target for 2014.

That’s all for this year, I’m Jane Houston Jones

Venus kissed the moon – a daytime occultation of Venus

jane — Sat, 18 Aug 2012 21:41:26 +0000

going

gone!

Venus reappears!

If you were up before sunrise on Monday, August 13th, 2012 you might have seen a very bright “star” next to the moon. As dawn turned to daylight, you could still see that star, or rather, that planet in the daytime snuggled up to the crescent moon.

That planet was Venus, and the moon was about to pass directly in front of it as seen from our vantage point on Earth. An occultation occurs when a solar system body passes in front of a more distant one or a star. Each one is only visible from a certain part of Earth. This occultation of Venus by the moon was only visible over northern Asia and Japan at night and over North America during the daytime.

I set an alarm to remind myself to step outside at about noon on Monday. It was a challenge to find the slender crescent moon, but I had a great view, shielded from the sun by the tall wall of my office building. The shadow helped by boosting the viewing contrast a little, too!

I had no difficulty seeing Venus naked-eye. And for about an hour I held court on the steps to JPL’s famed Space Flight Operations Facility or SFOF for short, and showed a daytime planet to several dozen of my colleagues. At about 1:30 p.m. PDT the moon passed in front of Venus after inching closer for over a half hour.

I was reminded of folksinger Christine Lavin’s lovely song Venus Kissed the Moon from her 1990 album Attainable Love. The lyrics go like this:

Venus kissed the Moon tonight
We watched her in the Sky
She’s been flirtin’ with him for centuries
Too bad he’s so shy
He’s waxing
He’s waning
You don’t see Venus complaining
She’ll steal a kiss whenever she can
Not ’till 2031
Will this happen again

There have actually been several Venus/Moon occultations since Christine wrote this song, but that doesn’t matter. I hummed her sweet song, and watched Venus flirt closer and closer to the moon. I’m listening to it as I write these words, too!

My friend Akkana Peck wrote “If you’ve never seen a Venus occultation before, you’ll be amazed at the difference between the brightness of Venus and the dimness of the moon’s limb. We think of the moon as bright, but it’s actually dark grey, about the same albedo (reflectivity) as asphalt; whereas Venus is covered with brightly reflective clouds.” See Akkana’s images of the Venus occultation and her blog here.

I snapped a few pictures with my hand-held Canon PowerShot SX260 HS with its nifty 20x zoom. I zoomed nearly all the way out for these images.

The next opportunity to see a lunar occultation of Venus from North and Central America will be on December 7, 2015. From Los Angeles, we’ll get to see this event from 7:30 am to 11:30 am.

I’m so glad we don’t have to wait until 2031 to see Venus kiss the moon, Christine!

Observing in the neighborhood

jane — Thu, 21 Jun 2012 05:09:52 +0000

Summer Milky Way, Scorpius and dark nebulae, image by Morris Jones

Observing near the summer solstice means a short observing night sandwiched between a late sunset and an early dawn. Rather than rush through an observing project I find it’s a great time of the year to sit back and trace familiar constellations in my minds eye, and marvel with anticipation as the eastern horizon brightens. Soon, the stars of Scorpius and Sagittarius will rise and the “clouds” on the horizon take shape as lumps and glittery clusters, bisected by dark nebulae — those mysterious star-less regions within our Milky Way Galaxy.

It’s hard not to just sit and gaze at the unfolding spectacle. So for the first hour or two after darkness last Saturday night (June 16, 2012) I sat in my meteor observing chair and observed the sky with my own eyes. Every now and then I jumped up and eyeball-aimed Mojo’s 15-inch Litebox reflector at this cluster or that nebula. The sky conditions at Amboy Crater were near perfect.

We have 360 degree perfect horizons at this site, with small light domes from 29 Palms, and from departing trains. Temperatures are warm with just a hint of breeze, hot before sunset, shirtsleeve observing all night long, humidity 10% rising to 20% at dawn. Conditions are dry and warm. No dew. Ever! Here’s the Clear Sky Chart for Amboy Crater.

Lyra

Ophiuchus and Poniatowski's Bull

the demoted constellation Poniatowski's Bull and Ophiuchus

As I was looking at the constellation Lyra and its gem-of-a-telescope-target, the Ring nebula, M57, I spotted an asterism nearby, in the northeastern section of Ophiuchus that looked just like Lyra, except it was upside down.

That looked like a good place to select an observing project, so I cracked open my copy of the Night Sky Observers Guide, volume 2 Spring and Summer to the constellation Ophiuchus. I noticed this little group of stars that looked like Lyra were part of an open cluster, and that there was another pretty cluster in the neighborhood.

Best of all, Barnard’s Star was within the cluster! Barnard’s Star is the second closest star to the Earth — only 6 light years away, shining at a faint magnitude 9.5. The Alpha Centauri system, including Proxima Centauri, together are about 4 LY away, but we can’t see them from the US. Barnard’s Star has the greatest proper motion — the angular annual movement across the line of sight against the distant stellar background of any star. It moves 10.4 seconds of arc per year. That compares to a quarter of a degree in a human lifetime, roughly the angular diameter of the full Moon.

Amateur astronomers, carefully sketching or imaging Barnard’s Star once a year for a couple years can actually track the movement of the star. It’s a cool red dwarf. And it’s listed in Jim Kaler’s fabulous book The Hundred Greatest Stars. Jim writes “Barnard’s Star has a metal content only 10 percent that of the Sun. That coupled with its high velocity shows it to be a special, rather rare, kind of star called a “subdwarf” that more belongs to the metal-poor and ancient halo of our Galaxy (the Sun belonging to the disk). It is merely passing through our local neighborhood.”

You’ll definitely need a star chart to find it. Here’s one showing Barnard’s Star within the Melotte 186 star cluster with pretty IC 4665 nearby. This tiny faint red dwarf is a challenge, but it’s worth it, as are the two clusters.

The neighborhood it’s passing (to our line of sight), is through the demoted constellation Poniatowski’s Bull. This V- shaped set of stars looks like a bull’s head and horns in northeastern Ophiuchus. I see Lyra, instead, by adding a few other stars. It was named Poniatowski’s Bull (Taurus Poniatovii), to honor Stanislaus Poniatowski, King of Poland from 1764 to 1795. Named by Polish-Lithuanian astronomer and mathemetician Marcin Odlanicki Poczobutt whose observatory at Vilnius gained royal favor from the King.

So now, when you are looking at our Milky Way, notice Vega and her constellation Lyra. Then turn your head ever so slightly to the right, and you’ll see huge Ophiucus, which looks like a big percolator coffee pot to me. It’s above and between Scorpius and Sagittarius. The left star of the “lid” of the coffeepot is part of my “upside down Lyra”.

Nothing beats visual astronomy. Without taking the time to sit down and just look at the sky, and trace the constellations I never would have discovered this lovely demoted constellation for the first time!

There is always something to observe that you’ve never seen before, even if it is the same old stars. That’s what makes visual astronomy my go-to hobby. Pun intended!

Mojo’s images and writeup from the same night: predawn planets & astrophotography

More Fast Moving Stars

More Demoted Constellations

Early morning hikes – the Chuckwallas of Amboy Crater

NASA Social at Dryden Flight Research Center, May 4, 2012

jane — Tue, 08 May 2012 21:53:06 +0000

This way to the first @DrydenSocial

New NASA Social lanyard, badge and patch, old tweetup pins

Here I am inside the Astronaut CTV (Crew Transport Vehicle) I would have laid down on the bed I'm sitting on, but I was too excited!

Here are the fabulous handouts and books for the attendees

My other car is not an F-18 Hornet

I was one of the lucky attendees at the first NASA Social at Dryden Flight Research Center last Friday, May 4, 2012. Here’s my first blog about the event — a play-by-play rundown of the speakers and tours on the agenda. NASA selects attendees who use social media, so naturally we’re encouraged to share the experience. Who wouldn’t want to do that, anyway? Here’s my social self for you to follow if you’d like: @jhjones on Twitter and JaneHoustonJones on Facebook. My NASA video podcast, What’s Up, with RSS feed and iTunes link is here, on YouTube here, and expanded with educational activites, starcharts and web links here.

But, first of all, I’d like to offer my sincere thanks to the Dryden Office of Strategic Communications team for a flawless and exhilarating experience! Thank you Kevin, Lisa, Terry, Beth, Leslie, and the many others who put this event together. Thanks to the speakers, the pilots, and the many interpreters, managers, AV team, oh, gosh thanks everyone at the Dryden Flight Research Center for allowing 50 Aeronautical geeks/social media savants into your world for a day. We really appreciated it!

In looking over the agenda, I noticed a url below every single speaker’s name and most of the aircraft and other venues we visited. What a brilliant addition to the program!

Introductions
Kevin Rohrer, Chief of the Office of Strategic Communications Kevin’s Bio
Stuff I learned: Kevin makes his own beer, and drinks it too!

Welcome
David McBride, Center Director David’s bio
Stuff I learned: Dryden has the most manned launches of ANY @NASA center! And David watches my What’s Up podcast via itunes on his iPad.

History of Dryden Flight Research Center
Christian Gelzer, Chief Historian About Dryden Stuff I learned: Dryden started in 1946 to test the X-1 and find out if supersonic flight was possible (and survivable).

Sonic Booms
Ed Haering, NASA Aerospace Engineer
Sonic Booms
Dryden sonic boom research Stuff I learned: “The boom you heard today started in 1947. You look out on the lake bed and realize how blessed you are to be doing this.”

Historical aircraft tour
Pete Merlin, Dryden Historian
X-1E
LLRV-Lunar Landing Research Vehicle Stuff I learned: The LLRV was used to study and analyze piloting techniques needed to fly and land the Apollo Lunar Module in the moon’s airless environment
M2-F1 lifting body I learned: M=Manned, F= Flight. The wingless, lifting body aircraft design was initially conceived as a means of landing an aircraft horizontally after atmospheric reentry.

Global Hawk (unmanned)
Phil Hill, NOAA Pilot
Global Hawk Learned: is an unmanned aircraft for high-altitude, long-duration Earth science missions. 111,000 nautical mile range, 30-hour endurance.

Ikhana (Predator B unmanned)
Hernan Posada, Mark Pestana
Ikhana – unmanned science demonstration aircraft. I learned Mark Pestana’s daughter is an intern at JPL, in fact, ~~I’m meeting her tomorrow~~ I met her two days ago and took her on a tour of JPL’s Space Flight Operations Facility “Darkroom”. And I learned Ikhana is a Choctaw Native American word for “intelligent, conscious, or aware, and this drone is used to conduct long-duration Earth observations. One more thing I learned: Mark Designs NASA Mission Patches in his spare time!

Gulfstream- III
Ethan Baumann and Natalie Spivey, NASA Engineers
Gulfstream-III Learned – it’s a multi-role cooperative research platform testbed for a variety of flight research experiments.

Dryden Pilots
Nils Larson, Acting Chief pilot Nils’ bio
Stuff I heard: Great quotes on working at Dryden: “”You look out at the lakebed and you think ‘It’s so cool’…It’s like being paid to eat ice cream.” “U-2 most difficult plane to fly, F/A-18 most fun, F-15 is the Cadillac” Why did you choose @nasaDryden? “Dryden is Mecca for test pilots” “flew between 90 & 100 different planes, blimps, etc. U2 is fun to fly because it can have bad day!”

Link to all Dryden Pilots (warning, includes many astronauts who worked here at Dryden.)

Lunch Break in the Dryden cafe – I had chicken salad with pilots in flight suits! @Camilla_SDO seated (perched) at the next table, gave me the stink-eye >.<

Automatic Collision Avoidance Technology
Mark Skoog, Project Manager
Automatic Collision Avoidance Technology Link to awesome avoidance vids posted soon. I learned to follow the lunch break with collision avoidance videos. Wow!

Flight Opportunities Program
John Kelly, NASA Program Manager
3 min Flight Opportunities vid Stuff I learned: Flight Opportunities system has tested orbital emergency surgery techniques and fire extinguishers prior to use on ISS, helping private companies test in more space-like environs, gets suborbital flights for payloads needing to fly in 0g, stuff like that.

Experimental Fabrication Lab
Ed Swan, Structural Fabrication Branch Chief
Experimental Fabrication Labs What I learned: Best quips of the day. “No aircraft flies here without something pointy sticking out of it.” and “What was your most interesting job?” / “Cutting a four-engine airplane in half.” “@NASADryden understands that parts need to be perfect, they give us our time. Parts can be worth millions in data. Best Quote: “You have a whole project waiting on the part, you don’t have time to tweet”. Here’s another Fabrication Lab feature.

Life Support
Phillip Wellner, Aircrew Life Support Technician
Dryden Aircrew Life Support Systems Stuff I learned: If a pilot flew above the Armstrong limit using only an oxygen mask and no pressure suit, the water wetting his lungs would boil as would the saliva in his mouth. Blood would boil too.
Stuff I watched: Phillip inflated a SR-71 flight suit with a shop vac, High-altitude flight suit fashion show, Helmet foo. Stuff I ate: high altitude Chicken a la king, Sloppy Joes, applesauce in a silvery toothpaste-ish tube.

Flight Load Labs
Larry Hudson, Chief Test Supervisor
Flight Loads Lab What I learned: Watched a plane flap its wings during flight load testing in fast motion. Large quartz lamps apply radiant energy to test airframes to simulate heat in flight. Flight Loads Lab tests not only structural loads, but heat and environmental loads, too!

Photography
Jim Ross, Multimedia Supervisor
Jim Ross link. Stuff I learned: Astronaut Gordon Fullerton, retired, former Chief Pilot at Dryden is mentioned in nearly every presentation. He referred to Jim Ross (and other video/photog staff) as “self loading baggage” with a wink, I bet. (I tweeted that!) Bonus: We all got autographed shuttle/747 picture by Jim (#NASA904 and #OV103).

Videography
Lori Losey, Senior Video Producer/Director
Here’s the video we saw. Lori Losey award writeup. What I learned: Awesome presentation, more great quotes from Lori: I have the best seat in the house. “You can Puke in a bag at 3G’s. You tie it off, put it in your suit, and keep filming.” “Compressed my spine, dislocated my shoulder, bruises from harnesses.”

Hangar 4802 (Aircraft tour and F-18 cockpit photos)
F-18 Hornet aircraft It was an FA-18 flyover test with a sonic boom for the @DrydenSocial!
Crew Transportation Vehicle Learned: Seven seats (and a few beds) for seven Shuttle astronauts in the Crew Transport Vehicle.
YO-3 Only 11 YO-3′s built in the Vietnam era and this is the only remaining functional one. Used for baseline sound tests (it’s very quiet) YO-3A propeller: 78 layers of birch.
T-34 At Dryden, the T-34C is primarily used for chasing remotely piloted unmanned air vehicles which fly slower than NASA’s F-18′s mission support aircraft can fly. It is also used for required pilot proficiency flying.
T-48 This is the 1st time the public has been allowed to see the X-48C Hybrid Wing Body.
Gulfstream II NASA 944, one of four Gulfstream II Shuttle Training Aircraft, arrived at NASA’s Dryden Flight Research Center from the Johnson Space Center in Houston Aug. 19 in preparation for its retirement and eventual static display.
Beechcraft Kingair One of Dryden’s King Air aircraft, NASA 801, (N801NA) serves as a testbed for various research projects, and is also flown for a range of mission support activities.

Media and blog links

May 1, 2012 feature Behind the Scenes @NASADryden

May 7, 2012 feature NASA Social: Behind the Scenes at Dryden

See what the #DrydenSocial attendees tweeted here!

Flying through the Leonid Storm of 2002, aboard NASA Dryden’s DC-8 Airborne Research Laboratory with Astronaut Gordon Fullerton as our pilot. Lots of interior DC-8 photos of our scientific equipment, too.

Counting meteors from Amboy Crater – Lyrids 2012

jane — Thu, 03 May 2012 20:33:50 +0000

Amboy Crater at dawn

2012 Lyrid Meteor Shower Meteor Profile showing peak near 04h-06h UTC

My visual meteor observing report with 30 minute (or less) intervals, and magnitude distribution

Saturday night, April 21, Mojo and I headed to our new favorite dark sky spot, Amboy Crater, one of the darkest observing locations in the US. This spot has great horizons and its remoteness keeps all but the serious observers away, though we’ve met delightful observing buddies at this spot. Our one way drive from Monrovia, CA is 170 miles, fyi.

After a night of observing, you can’t beat the morning hike to Amboy Crater, a 6,000 year old volcanic cinder cone, either. Even in the summer it’s cool at dawn. Look carefully at the oxidized lava beds as you follow the hiking trail to the crater and you might find some Chuckwalla lizards! Chuckwallas can reach 16 inches in length, weigh up to 2 pounds and are specially adapted for desert living. Chuckwallas are my very favorite herps, well, next to the desert tortoise, that is.

The peak of the Lyrids occured at 1:30 a.m. Eastern (10:30 Pacific). The constellation Lyra was barely above my horizon at that hour. This meant the highest rates were probably recorded several time zones east of my California location. I set up my observing area, shut my eyes until about 11:00 p.m., and then I managed to observe straight through the night — from 11:40 p.m. until just before dawn at 5:16 (6:40h – 12:16h UT).

Here are a few tips I use to prepare myself for a night of meteor counting. First, I read Bob Lunsford’s weekly meteor shower recap on the Yahoo meteorobs group email list which discusses amateur meteor astronomy. It’s a good place to “lurk” and learn.

Bob wrote “The Lyrid (LYR) shower is expected to reach maximum activity on the night of April 21/22 with rates up to 15 shower members per hour. The radiant is located at 18:08 (272) +33. This area of the sky is actually located in extreme eastern Hercules, eight degrees southwest of the brilliant blue-white star Vega (Alpha Lyrae). The radiant is best placed just before the break of dawn when the radiant lies highest in the sky. While Lyrid meteors can be seen in both hemispheres, the north is favored as the radiant lies much higher in the sky. Rates will fall rapidly after maximum and little activity will be seen the remainder of the week. At 48km/sec. the Lyrids would produce meteors of medium-swift velocity. It should be noted that the Lyrids can occasionally produce bright meteors of fireball class magnitude.”

Next I familiarized myself with the spring sky and printed out some all-sky charts, marking the radiant between Lyra’s bright star Vega, and the Keystone section of Hercules. I then decided where to look — 50-70 degrees above the horizon, 20-40 degrees away from the radiant. I selected the area around the bright star Arcturus in the constellation Bootes. When counting meteors you don’t want to look directly at the radiant as the meteors will look like short streaks, or points of light.

For this shower the rates were not expected to be too high, so I decided to record (for my first time) the magnitude of each meteor. I made a note of the magnitude of Saturn, Mars and Venus and re-familiarized myself with the magnitudes of many bright stars nearby during my prep time. Then, I selected two small constellations (Corona Borealis, and the head of Draco) which contain magnitude 2-5 stars and memorized their magnitude.

Armed with all these stellar magnitudes, I settled down and waited for it to get dark. Once it did, I began the first important observation — estimating the limiting magnitude. The limiting magnitude is the magnitude of the faintest star near the zenith that the observer can detect using the slightly averted naked eye. It defines both the condition of the sky’s clarity and the quality of the observer’s eyes. I keep a set of these charts on a clipboard and take them with me on all observing trips, even if I am not observing meteors. Every 30-45 minutes, between my half-hour counting sessions, I re-counted the stars in the selected areas, to note any changes in the sky clarity or the condition of my own eyes.

In a nutshell my skies were Magnitude 6.5, which is very dark. Weather conditions: clear, 98 degrees at sunset, 62 degrees at dawn. It was a shirtsleeve weather night almost all night long, tho’ I put on a fleece jacket at about 4 a.m.

Between 11:40 p.m.and 5:16 a.m. (06:40h – 12:16h UT) I counted 36 Lyrids, 6 Sporadics and 2 Anthelion meteors. A quarter of the Lyrids I saw were very bright -1 or brighter meteors. I took short breaks between counting sessions to re-estimate the limiting magnitude, have a snack, check on what Mojo was imaging through his telescope, stargaze through my own scope, etc.

06:40h-07:10h UT – 7 Lyrids
07:30h-08:00h UT – 3 Lyrids
08:15h-08:45h UT – 5 Lyrids, 1 sporadic
08:50h-09:20h UT – 5 Lyrids, 1 sporadic
09:30h-10:00h UT – 6 Lyrids, 2 sporadics
10:05h-10:25h UT – 1 Lyrids, 1 sporadics, 1 Anthelion
Break to look at Saturn, have a snack, scan Milky Way
10:59h-11:29h UT – 2 Lyrids, 1 Anthelion
11:30h-12:00h UT – 7 Lyrids (2 fireballs!)
12:01h-12:16h UT – 1 sporadic

You can see that I saw the most meteors just as I was getting started (which was near the peak) and again near dawn (when Lyra was at its highest in the sky). Just before 5 a.m. 12h UT both Mojo and I saw a very bright bollide, greenish in color in the western sky. I estimated its magnitude at -5, brighter than Venus. It probably was much brighter. Coincidentally, 3 hours later an even more impressive bollide streaked across the California Sierra foothills, and broke up in the atmosphere, sprinkling meteorites over a wide populated area. Both of these bollides were Lyrid fireballs!

My other Meteor blogs and adventures

Flying through the Leonid Storm of 1999 – aboard USAF’s ARIA from Edwards AFB

Leonids 2002 – aboard NASA’s DC-8 from Dryden Flight Research Center

Observing meteors from the city – yes you can!

My meteor observing gear

January Quadrantids and a demoted constellation

August Perseids and meteor recording tips

Lyrid 4/22/12 fireball movie with radiant map

Mojo’s astrophotography from Lyrid shower night

Viewing meteor showers from light polluted LA – not impossible!

jane — Mon, 09 Jan 2012 05:17:29 +0000

The white area is greater Los Angeles. I observed from my driveway in Monrovia, indicated at the "red/white" border zone marked with cross-hairs

My meteor watching setup - comfortable chair, blanket, clipboard, red flashlights, clock, binoculars, snacks

The graph shows the ZHR (Zenithal Hourly Rate), which is the number of meteors an observer would see under a very dark sky with the radiant of the shower overhead. (this chart is being updated as more reports are submitted)

I prefer to drive far from LA to view meteor showers from a dark sky, but those darn showers don’t always happen on weekends or days I can take off work. So this week, I observed the Quadrantid Meteor Shower from my bright moonlit Los Angeles County driveway until after midnight, snoozed until moonset at 3:00 a.m., then had a fairly decent sky from 3:00 a.m. to 5:15 a.m. when the sky started to brighten from the dawn light. Although I didn’t see many meteors, and only one before the moon set at 3:00 a.m. PST January 4th, I was thrilled with my observations.

Take a look at this colorful map. See that white blob? That’s Los Angeles on a light pollution map. That white ribbon? That’s the California coastline. White on these maps designates the most light polluted areas in the world. There is no worse place for light pollution. LA is the model of a major metropolitan meteor-observing maelstrom of star-obscuring light pollution. This white color on the map is described in bleak terms on the Clear Sky Chart website’s light pollution map page: “The entire sky is grayish or brighter. Familiar constellations are missing stars. Fainter constellations are absent. Less than 20 stars visible over 30 degrees elevation in brighter areas. Limiting magnitude ranges from 3 to 4. Most people don’t look up.” Monrovia is on the north edge of the white blob that is Los Angeles, indicated by the cross-hair. (all those little crosses on the map are other astronomy locations). Red is the next to worst light pollution zone, and the ribbon of red color next to Los Angeles is the San Gabriel Mountain foothills. Monrovia is nestled between the Los Angeles basin and the mountains. It’s fine for moon and planets at our monthly Old Town Sidewalk Astronomy nights, not so good for meteors and anything else astronomical.

The three oval white blobs on the left lower quadrant are Santa Catalina, San Clemente and San Nicholas Islands! The yellow, green and blue zones are in the ocean. It’s even light polluted well off the coast of Southern California!

I usually drive 150-300 miles to one of the black teardrop shaped pin spots on this light pollution map of California. Those are the best and darkest locations for the stargazing and astrophotography we enjoy. Mojo and I prefer Amboy Crater, Hole-In-the-Wall Campground in Mojave National Preserve, and a spot near Desert Center 60 miles past Indio on I-10. We also love the dark skies at Glacier Point at Yosemite.

But this week was the peak of the Quadrantids, and I didn’t want to drive a 6-hour round trip for 3 hours of meteor watching, especially on a work night. So I found a good spot in my driveway and it blocked a lot of the local light sources. I nestled my comfy observing chair up next to a cinder block wall. This wall, plus strategically placed tall trees blocked the moonlight and oncoming car lights from my view. To my south was not the Milky Way, but the milky gray — the color of skies over Los Angeles. I could see the big dipper stars, and part of the little dipper. Below these two constellations was the radiant of the Quadrantids. This area wouldn’t even rise until after midnight, but I wanted to say I observed the Quadrantids during the actual peak, and check for earthgrazing meteors on the horizon.

I estimated my limiting magnitude at a dismal 3.9 using star counting charts. I settled into my meteor-watching chair, sipped some hot green tea and waited. And waited. And waited some more. From 11:00 p.m. until 12:30 p.m (PST) I saw exactly one meteor, and it wasn’t even a Quadrantid. The moon was high overhead now, and so I snoozed until moonset at 3:00 a.m. Wednesday morning.

When my alarm went off, I headed back out to the driveway. I adjusted my chair, adjusted the dark blankets I placed over the fence between my driveway and the neighbor’s all-night security lights. By careful placement of my head, and with blankets on the fences and shrubs I had no lights shining directly at me.

It was a little after 3 a.m. and I started observing an area above the radiant, centered on the bowl of the big dipper. My back was facing the well-lit LA basin, my view to the north was overlooking the San Gabriel mountains and Mt. Wilson Observatory. By 3:18 I had seen my first Quadrantid. At 3:30 I counted stars again. Without the moonlight, my limiting magnitude rose to a respectable 5.1 using this star counting chart. I repeated this exercise several times, until I could barely see stars after 5:00 a.m. My last limiting magnitude calculation before I packed it in was 2.9.

This chart shows the data from 48 observers in twenty countries. Data (still coming in, I’ll update the chart a couple of times) is averaged based on the observers seeing conditions, visual acuity, cloud cover percentage, etc. You can see that the highest rates — at the peak of the Quadrantids were in excess of 80 per hour. This is the number of meteors which would be seen overhead at the zenith (in a dark sky) if the highest rate was kept steady for one hour. In reality, the highest rates last usually for only a few minutes for showers like the Quadrantids with a very narrow peak. How many did I see from my Monrovia driveway? I saw three from 3:00-3:30 a.m. and another three from 3:30-4:00 a.m. I saw five from 4:00 to 4:30 a.m. and between 4:30 and 5:00 a.m. I saw three, plus heard nearby roosters crowing! I finished the observing with 2 more Quadrantids between 5:00 and 5:15 a.m. and was heralded by a veritable rooster symphony as the sky brightened. My total count over a little more than 2 hours was 16 lovely Quadrantids, two sporadics, and one Anthelion! Here’s my report which I submitted to the International Meteor Organization. Amazingly, this number is almost exactly the prediction from NASA’s Meteor Fluxtimator when I entered Quadrantids from downtown Los Angeles on the 3rd and 4th of January 2012. How about that! You can observe a meteor shower from Los Angeles!

Here’s the meteor shower calendar for 2012

Interested in counting meteors? Here’s the IMO Visual meteor observing form plus instructions and FAQs

More about the Quadrantids and their namesake constellation, Quadrans Muralis

Post-Perseid depression (or how to observe meteor showers)

Perseids from Amboy Crater (a dark sky site)

Autumn observing – around the South Galactic Pole

jane — Sat, 12 Nov 2011 00:55:05 +0000

Herald-Bobroff Astroatlas

Astroatlas B Chart page for Grus and Telescopium, well below Capricornus and Sagittarius

NGC131 and 134 and a 5-spot of mag 10 stars

NGC55 image by Morris Jones, used with permission

While Mojo and I were observing at Amboy Crater on October 22, 2011, Cliff, another observer at the site pointed out the constellation Grus, The Crane, low on the southern horizon. Grus isn’t a constellation I’ve paid attention to before – you need to be able to see down to the southern horizon in the fall, and you need to be observing at +34N Latitude or further south. If you can see well below Capricornus, Sagittarius and Sculptor in the autumn, give it a try!

None of the star charts I brought on that occasion showed Grus, but I had just the startool at home for the following weekends (October 29) outing — the Herald-Bobroff Astroatlas! I hadn’t needed this lovely atlas since my 1999 Ayer’s Rock Australian observing trip with 20 other astronomers, and welcomed reacquainting myself with it. The atlas begins with the A Charts – wide swaths of the sky, showing several entire constellations. From there you are directed to the B Charts (image at your left), showing smaller segments of the sky and bright stars. The C Charts (9th mag stars and 14th mag. deep sky objects) are where I headed for this night’s observing, but in the past I have drilled down to the D (11th mag. stars and 15th mag deep sky objects), E and F charts for detail showing Coma and Virgo galaxy clusters and the Magellanic Clouds.

There aren’t any bright galaxies to hunt for in the constellation Grus, and observing low to the horizon doesn’t afford the best views, either. But even so, I quickly observed the top ten or so – including some lovely galaxy clusters. First I went for NGC7590 and 7599, a pretty pair of spiral galaxies discovered by John Herschel and Charles Dunlop. I didn’t see the distant Abell 1111 cluster, 2 billion light years away, just the two brighter galaxies.

Next I hunted down a group of galaxies near NGC7418 – a face-on spiral galaxy nestled in a pretty string just below Fomalhaut on the Grus Sculptor border. Here’s a photo of the galaxies I observed. 7418 was discovered by Sir John Herschel at the Cape of Good Hope with an 18-inch f/13 speculum telescope in 1847. A supernova erupted in this galaxy in 1983. And Allan Sandage (1975, Astrophysical Journal, 202, 563-582) notes that this galaxy is a member of the IC1459 Grus Group.

Well after midnight on this perfect observing night, our friend Dave came over and told me he had just observed some objects he had not logged before. “A pair of galaxies, with a little dice-shaped asterism of five stars next to it”. Soon I was on my own hunt for NGC131 and 134. It’s to the lower left of big open cluster Blanco 1 on the star chart. The smaller 131 was discovered by John Herschel in 1834, and the larger 134 was discovered in 1826 by James Dunlop in Australia. They are part of our local group of galaxies (LGG), and the galaxy group is also known as LGG-007 located 63 to 82 million lights years away. My sketch is to the left.

This part of the sky is littered with easy to find galaxies, and I spent several hours hopping from one to another. I was observing NGC55, an interesting barred irregular galaxy only 7 million light years away. It’s one of the closest galaxies to our own local group! I encouraged Mojo image it, even though it was low to the horizon. I love his image, and it looked a lot like this through the eyepiece, too. I made a rough sketch of the galaxy, and when I looked at Mojo’s image we both showed the pretty lineup of stars outlining the galaxy.

This is just a sample of the dozens of galaxies I looked at in the deep southern sky on a late October evening. Fall offers long nights of darkness for galaxy starved amateur astronomers tired of all the bright milky way objects of summer. So ladies and gentleman, start your telescopes, and point as low as you can go. Aim your telescopes where the wings of the southern birds Grus and Phoenix fly. If you can’t go that low, Sculptor offers dozens of amazing objects to view. Open your atlas to the constellations around the South Galactic Pole near Sculptor, and you’ll enjoy hours of surfing the southern skies.

Here are Mojo’s Astrophotos from October 29, 2011. I enjoyed visually observing these objects, and then seeing these postcards sent from the universe through Mojo’s astrophotography.

Diagram of the Observable Universe

Review of the Herald-Bobroff Astroatlas

Images showing our observing spot at sunset and waiting for moonset