April 20 2010, Thank you Owlice. I live in Los Angeles and once in a while here; if one is lucky, you can see a moon through the haze
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I have to agree Ann, here in Yorkshire too the winter has not been as good as the year before for stargazing, or as good as previous years in my memory for that matter, but on the few bitterly cold nights that have been good viewing, the viewing has been so good that it has almost made up for it . . . almost, but not quite! It just doesn't feel quite right walking the dogs up the fields on a dark evening without the majesty of a dome of stars overhead.Ann wrote:It's been a terrible winter for star-watching; the sky has been overcast for what feels like months on end, and when the clouds on rare occasions have parted it has been absolutely brutally cold.
I've not heard of a Sun Pillar before - it sounds wonderful.starstruck wrote:Well, not what did I see in the sky "tonight", but at sunrise this morning. I was rewarded with my first ever Sun Pillar; a vertical column of brightness in the peachy coloured sky extending straight up above the orange orb of the sun as it rose through low-lying mist in the valley. It was breathtakingly, silently beautiful.
I have to agree Ann, here in Yorkshire too the winter has not been as good as the year before for stargazing, or as good as previous years in my memory for that matter, but on the few bitterly cold nights that have been good viewing, the viewing has been so good that it has almost made up for it . . . almost, but not quite! It just doesn't feel quite right walking the dogs up the fields on a dark evening without the majesty of a dome of stars overhead.Ann wrote:It's been a terrible winter for star-watching; the sky has been overcast for what feels like months on end, and when the clouds on rare occasions have parted it has been absolutely brutally cold.
I didn't mention it online here at the time, but on one of those walks I was lucky enough to see an amazing green tinted metoer streak from east to west across the northern sky on January 30th at about 9pm, very bright, with quite an extended trail, it lasted several seconds. Best one I can ever remember seeing. But, of course, it paled into insignificance by comparison to the Russian meteor that made the headlines in February!
May I recommend going outside? Even without a plastic-wrapped house, I find it infinitely superior to observing through the windows!Ann wrote:According to plan, we will be let out of our plastic pupa in late May. Until then, I'm not likely to see anything much at all in the sky on any night!
As for doing the math, I don't know - but the project in itself, what fun!rstevenson wrote:Last night I saw Betelgeuse and Rigel!
Yeah, I know, that's pretty easy to do. But I was looking at those two supergiants via the Ealing 41cm diameter Cassegrain reflecting telescope at the Burke-Gaffney Observatory, at Saint Mary's University here in Halifax. I was doing that as part of my Astrophysics observing project, attempting to get comparative magnitudes in both B and V filters for each of them, to derive their temperatures and other useful-to-geeks stuff. As often happens, more went wrong than right. But that's okay, as it was my first attempt at doing such things, and I learn more from my mistakes (thank goodness) than my successes. Not to worry about the health of the telescope -- all the real work was done by Stephen Burke, guardian of the keep. I just had to take notes and nod as if I understood what he was saying.
As a consequence I now have a busy weekend ahead, writing up my notes in human-readable format, figuring out and regurgitating what we learned. What fun!
Rob
Well, I get up at two or two thirty in the morning. At that time, I don't feel like going out. I leave my apartment at five. Then I'm in a hurry and have no time to look at the sky. Anyway, the sky will soon be so light at that time that you can't see the stars. Because I get up so early, I'm extremely tired in the evening and have no energy for star watching. I go to bed at seven, or eight at the latest. Soon the Sun won't even have set at eight p.m., and certainly not at seven!Chris Peterson wrote:May I recommend going outside? Even without a plastic-wrapped house, I find it infinitely superior to observing through the windows!Ann wrote:According to plan, we will be let out of our plastic pupa in late May. Until then, I'm not likely to see anything much at all in the sky on any night!
Doesn't this properly belong in the "weather" threadBeyond wrote:
O-boy! Not a cloud in the sky and the sun setting.I grab my binoculars to finally see the comet.Hark! What this way comethWhy tis clouds, comeing from the setting sun, moveing to the north-west,with a little milkyness around them.DRAT!! I officially give up
on trying to see the flying pan of stars
So now there is a Astronomically Bad joke on me, in the Astronomical thread.
I saw it with my telescope before sunset. The observatory walls don't let me get to the horizon, so I can't see it later. I was doing some work with the observatory software, and since things were set up decided to point at the comet. Didn't really expect to see anything, but the coma showed up, looking star-like. No sign of the tail at all in the daylit sky, which isn't surprising.Beyond wrote:Only as pertaining to whether or not i got to see the dusty ice-ball. Seeing as how i didn't, there was no Whether involved. :lol2:
Easy for you to say. You've got a Big eyeChris Peterson wrote:Had a nice view of Jupiter while I was at it (which is always easy in daylight).
Jupiter is easy in binoculars, as long as you can figure out where to point them. That's the hard part, not actually seeing it.Beyond wrote:Easy for you to say. You've got a Big eye :?: -----I=====I :saturn: :mrgreen:Chris Peterson wrote:Had a nice view of Jupiter while I was at it (which is always easy in daylight).