Harford County Astronomical Society

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1 Harford County Astronomical Society Monthly Newsletter Volume 37 Issue 2 February 2011 Public Star Party March 12, 2011 at 7 pm At the HCAS Observatory General Meeting March 17, 2011 at 7:00pm In the HCAS Classroom Please check our website for possible schedule updates and changes: 1

2 In This Issue: HCAS Business Meeting Minutes...p.2 Outreach...p.4 Astrophotography...p.5 Miscellaneous Reports and Announcements... p.10 HCAS General Meeting Minutes of January 20, 2011 The meeting was called to order at 7:08pm by President Tom Rusek. The minutes from the November meeting was approved as published in the Newsletter in December. There was no December meeting due to weather. Treasurer's Report: We have $ in the checking account, approximately $46. in the PayPal account. Currently up to 56 members. Grace reports that we will be submitting receipts to the HCC Foundation to get the money from Walmart, which currently is $500. We received a grant for $820. from the RTMC Homefront Committee to purchase an Orion Mount. It is suggested that we look to buy a telescope that will go with the mount that the camera can be used on. Board Meeting on Sunday, January 16 had much discussion on a budget. Tim produced a spreadsheet showing income and expenditures for the past 3 years. We have run at a deficit for the past 3 years, however, it was noted that we did have a large balance to begin with, with the sale of some old equipment, and we did purchase new and expensive equipment. Tom states that in the future, expenditures will need to be approved in advance, and a budget, once approved, will not be exceeded. Newsletter issues: There was no General meeting, and the issue was full of observing notes and Astrophotography. There was a lovely shot of the Blue Snowball Planetary Nebula. It is noted that articles about equipment reviews are also good for the group. Website: We have submitted the Newsletter and the Website for an award for the Astronomical League. This is a very prestigious award, and we look forward to hearing the results in May or June. Outreach: Past events - The Open House on December 11 had 61 guests, including a Cub Scout troop. The Lunar Eclipse Open House had 9 members and 23 non-members show up. The Open House on January 15 had 17 guests, including a Cub Scout Troop. Upcoming events: Patterson Mill High School was scheduled for February 10 (this has since been moved to March 10). Please contact Grace or Gary. DOD/APG Program for Children is scheduled for 4 Thursdays in February (this program has actually been canceled by DOD/APG). Camp Oest is asking for volunteers for a program on January 29th. Eden Mill is asking for a summer program/constellation program. There is an upcoming meeting in BelAir to discuss this 2

3 program. Edgewood Middle School is asking for 6-45 minutes presentations in the spring. They do have their own Planetarium. The Astronomical League has suggested to all members to not discourage our visitors and guests. This may be their first foray into astronomy, and it is important that we make a good first impression. Show guests the biggest, brightest objects you can, this will spark their interest and keep the visitors coming back. The Cherry Springs Star Party is Memorial Day weekend (May 26-30) and Black Forest Star Party is August Astrophotography: If you are interested in doing AP, you have to show interest! Get on the list. Many of the AP sessions are public. Borrowing the Club's camera is a benefit of our Membership, so bear in mind that not all events are open to the general membership. This is not meant to exclude people. More members need to be trained on the use of the 14" telescope and the Camera. The best way to do this is at the open sessions. Observatory Operations: Mark and Gary are working on getting the Dome motorized. When the weather gets warmer, this will be done. Grace is working on the equipment list of items that can be borrowed from the club. If you have any Club-owned equipment, please contact Grace. Recently, a good deal of office supplies have been missing from the Library. These have been purchased by the Club, and when they come up missing, it costs the Club more money to replace them. New addition to existing building: Tim reports the time line for the HVAC addition to the building. They have been very receptive to our suggestions regarding lighting and window placement. Ground breaking will be in April or May, and the job completed in August. At this time, it is expected that the building will be occupied by the HVAC program for 2 years, afterward, the building will become part of the Observatory. It is possible that we will have to relocate Open House events during the construction phase. Grace will contact the College and have an alternate site on standby on Open House nights. Observing Reports: Broad Creek has been cold, but with dark coming early, most people are done observing by 10pm. Please see newsletter for individual reports. Night Sky Network: There will be a presentation of pins at the February Meeting, Grace will send out an to those who qualify for pins will bring changes to the NSN Outreach award pin program. Each member will be responsible for reporting their own hours to the NSN. Grace will be holding a training session after the February meeting to train those interested. Miscellaneous business: The Washington School of Photography recently held an exhibit featuring astrophotos taken by Leo Heppner. The school will be donating the final pictures to the Club. Jeremy is working on a list of old equipment to be sold through Astromart. We have received a request from the Harford county Environmental Scholarship Program. Welcome to Jack and Holly, guests at tonight's meeting. The meeting was adjourned at 8:10pm. - Karen Carey Current balance: Main checking account: $ Second Checking account: $ PayPal Account $ Total $ Treasurer's Report February 10, 2011 Membership now stands at 55 individuals and families with one new member this month. - Tim Kamel 3

4 Outreach HCAS Observatory Driveway Photo by Gail Edwards Open House February 12, 2011 Our second open house for the year and the weather cooperated, even though the forecast was iffy. We started early tonight in order to accommodate two scout troops programs and scheduled them for 6 PM, an hour before our regularly planned open house session. Both Troops arrived at the same time and we split them up, rotating them between the classroom, the office and the dome. Larry and Ricky provided views of the Moon and Jupiter, Karen and Tim B discussed different types of telescopes and Mark provided a general discussion on Astronomy. Participation by guests tonight was 41 scouts and parents and 28 visitors for the regular open house. We received $26 in donations from the scouts, Den 7, pack 238. Donating the money were Lisa, Stephanie and Alison Richardson. Participation by club members was Karen & Maggie, Larry and Ricky, Gary, Tim K, Roy, Tim B, Paul, Tony, Mark, Jeremy, Bill and Ray. It was a short session, pretty much done by 8:30 except for one straggler, a dad and 2 daughters. Some of the members (not me, though) hung around, preparing for a late night astrophotography session. It seems that there is a major storm on Saturn and the group wanted to photograph it. Saturn did not rise till 10 PM and would not clear the trees till after 11. It would be almost midnight before it was high enough to clear the murk of the atmosphere. The storm was scheduled to transit at 2:40 Sunday morning. - Tim Kamel 4

5 Astrophotography To see high-resolution versions of HCAS photographs, please visit our web site at: Photo by HCAS members. Saturn, with Storm February 12/13, 2011 A stalwart group of HCAS members remained at the observatory, following Saturday's Open House. Between 11pm and 2am, we observed and photographed Saturn, using the club's 14 Celestron telescope and Orion Planetary Imager. The seeing varied from good to awful, but we were able to obtain several video streams of Saturn images, which Larry Hubble used to compose the image above, with Photoshop. The white band in the upper (northern) hemisphere of the planet is a storm in Saturn's upper atmosphere that has been expanding for the past two weeks. It was invisible when we observed Saturn visually, but it did appear in the video. The Cassini division is clearly visible on the left and right sides of the planet's rings. Members present at the session were: Larry Hubble, Grace Wyatt, Tim Blanchard, Jeremy Kirkendall, Gary George, Roy Troxel and Cathy Tingler. - Roy Troxel The photo sure did turn out better than we expected! We used the observatory's C14 but were unable to spot it visually, as we thought it was rising a lot later and didn't know what to expect. You could easily pick out the dark band above the rings and the polar cap, but it was just a large white area between, but as it turns out, nearly 2/3 of the planet is covered in this storm at this point, so really, the huge white area with 0 contrast we observed WAS the storm. I'm counting it as an "observed but didn't realize it" object! We even cranked the C14 up to 1600x for fun, but couldn't pull any slightly variation in color or brightness 5

6 out of the storm's region. Seeing was a 3/5 for a short period before clouds became too thick and clouded us out. Saturn was dim due to thin clouds so gain had to be at 100% and our frame rate I believe was pretty low, only around 7 fps because it was so dark. We used an orion SSAG to capture the image and took about a 4 minute video, with only a small number of frames that we were able to use. - Jeremy Kirkendall NGC7331 in Pegasus, with companion galaxy NGC7335 Photographed by Gene Crist, Date: 10/09/2010 Location: Peoria, Arizona Camera: SBIG ST-8XME, Instrument: Celestron 11 SCT CGE Pro,Focal Length: F6.3. Exposure: Ten 5 minute guided 0ºC, averaged and processed in CCD Ops Gene Crist is a Baltimore native who now lives in the Phoenix, AZ area. He wants to correspond with astrophotographers across the country. His address is:ejcristjr@gmail.com. 6

7 HCAS Observatory Sunday, Jan. 30, 2011 Orion Nebula by Tim Kamel, Gary George and Roy Troxel Sunday was shaping up to be a nice day and a nice night. I was itching to do some astrophotography (AP) and put out a note. I was joined by Gary, Larry and Roy for a session that started at about 6 PM and ended around 9:30 or so. Our intent was to try and shoot the Blue Snowball Nebula at high power and see if we could get a better shot than the ones we had. I brought along my 2, 2X barlow, which would make the C-14 an F/22 scope, doubling the power over the previous shot. Snow was heavy on the observatory grounds but the driveway and parking lot were plowed. Most of the snow had fallen off the dome but some remained at the crown of the dome. As we opened the wind screen, we had some difficulty and used a broom handle to push it up. We could hear the ice falling off the back as we opened the screen. It was cold, with temps in the low 20 s. We got set up and were using Larry s DSLR with the Barlow. To make things short, we went through the ritual of focusing on a star, then slewing to the NGC 7662 (the Blue Snowball planetary nebula), got it centered, and started shooting. If I recall, we went for 30 one-minute shots and went downstairs to get warmed up. When we returned, we found that the sequence was completed, but the object was no longer in the field of view, having drifted off. Tracking was particularly poor that sequence. We suspect that the cold was the reason, though you d think that most mounts are made to be used in cold environments and should not have a problem with a measly 23 degrees. Larry was not able to use any of the shots. Larry then had to leave. Rather than pack up, the rest of us decided that we would try another object that did not require high power and that was bright enough that we could do with shorter exposures. We decided on M-42, the Great Nebula in Orion. It was getting late and we really did not have the time to shoot with the club s Star Shoot and the set up time that was required, so we used my DSLR and the f/6.3 focal reducer. Again, we focused and centered the Nebula, and we 7

8 took second shots. I used Deep Sky Stacker to stack 9 shots. It only took seven and gave me this shot. The real fun started when we tried to close the windscreen. It would not close. Apparently it had ridden up on the ice and the motor could not pull it down. After several tries, we brought up a ladder and a rope from the storage room and tied the rope to the wind screen. Our first try, with me pulling on the rope as we pushed the switch, did not work. We then tied another section of the rope to the wind screen. Roy and Gary then pulled on the ropes as I hit the switch and we were able to get the door shut. Lesson learned no more using the dome with ice on it. Tim HCAS Observatory Sunday, Feb. 6, 2011 Three-day crescent moon Photo by Tim Kamel and Roy Troxel This is a week since the last astrophotography (AP) session. Heavy snow is still on the ground, so Broad Creek is not accessible. Weather is iffy, with two web sites predicting mostly cloudy. One site predicting mostly mostly clear and the Clear Sky Chart predicting clear skies. Well, it was Super Bowl night. It was also the last weekend night where the moon would not be obtrusive. Tough choice. I put out a note to the members, intending to do an observing session. The Moon was a thin crescent. Jupiter was still fairly high. M-42 was prominent. Or, we could work on our HCAS-40. I guess the Super Bowl was too much competition. Only Roy responded. We started the session a little before 6:00 PM, still intending to do observing using the big scope. But I did bring my DSLR, just in case. We started off looking at the moon and the crater Petavius was prominent in the view we chose. The Rimae Petavius feature was quite distinct, catching the sunlight just right. We decided to shoot it and took several shots at different speeds. Next, we looked at Jupiter. Still the king of the night, the southern equatorial belt still had not reappeared. The four moons were prominent. We decided to also take some shots of Jupiter and did so. We stopped when some thin clouds came in and the views of Jupiter became soft. 8

9 Since we really came to do some visual observing, we returned to do that and were working of the HCAS-40 list. Finding an area of the sky free of clouds, we moved to Gemini and started with Castor, a tight double that was just barely split at 100 power using our 40 mm Plossl eyepiece. We upped the magnification to 150 using a 25 Edscorp Orthos and had a nice view of two white stars of roughly the same magnitude. It is very pretty and very bright in that scope. Next was M- 35, which was too big to see in the C-14 at our lowest possible power of 100 X. We tried using the guide scope but none of the eyepieces would reach focus. It seems like we needed a diagonal or extension and did not have one with us. Next up was NGC 2392, the Eskimo Nebula, a bright (Magnitude 9.0) and distinctly blue planetary. OK, we couldn t resist and decided to shoot it also. We went through the ritual of focusing and then centering, and set it up for fifteen 30-second shots and walked away to get warm in the classroom. We returned to find the shots to be dim due to some clouds that had moved it. We decided to try again and waited a few minutes for the clouds to move off. We again re-centered the nebula and programmed for another fifteen 30-second shots. Returning, we found the clouds had returned again and the shots were again dim. At this point, we called it quits, at about 9:30 or so. I have since tried to stack the shots of the Eskimo using two different programs and got nothing usable. I had some shots of Jupiter that were OK but the images were really tiny, not usable. The shots of the Petavius crater's area on the crescent moon came out pretty good and here is one of them. - Tim 9

10 NGC7293 (Helix Nebula) Photo by Jürgen Stein, Volkssternwarte astronomy club, Germany. A high-resolution version of this photo is at: Exposure Data: Date: October 10/11, 2010 Telescope: William Optics FLT f/7 with Field Flattener at 10Micron GM2000 mount Camera: SBIG ST -15 C Exposure: LRGB 18x600s / 5x600s / 5x600s / 5x600s. Not binned. Total exposure time: 5h30m. Location: Sahara Sky Hotel, Zagora, South Morocco Note: No flat field images could be taken cause of technical restrictions. 10

11 Miscellaneous Meteorite Of The Month Esquel Meteorite This is a stony-iron meteorite; only about 1 percent of all meteorites fall into this category. It is classified as a pallasite. It has an iron matrix with olivine crystals embedded within it. This one was found in 1951 at Chubut, Argentina, comprising of a single mass of 1500 kilograms. It was embedded in the ground. A little less than half of all stony iron meteorites are pallasites. This type of meteorite is considered to be the most attractive of all meteorites by many. The pictured specimen is a five-gram part slice, note the large unshattered olivine crystal within the iron matrix. - Phil Schmitz 11

12 Telescope for Sale I have a Zhumell 12" Dobsonian telescope for sale. I purchased it in August It has never been used and is in perfect condition. I have been using another telescope. I am asking $700 for it. I live in Fallston and any interested parties can drop me a line to come by and see the telescope. I would really appreciate it. Thank You, Tim Willig timwillig@gmail.com Cross Country Ct Fallston

13 This newsletter is the official publication of Harford County Astronomical Society P.O. Box 906, Bel Air, MD Items for the newsletter are due to the editor by the 13 th of the month of publication. Please send all contributions (electronic format is strongly encouraged) to: Roy Troxel at: Address regular mail to: HCAS Newsletter c/o Roy Troxel 301 Tiree Court #403, Abingdon, MD Permission is not necessary for non-profit use of this material, although proper acknowledgment is required. Address changes should be brought to the attention of the editor at the address given above. And be sure to visit our Web Site: Webmaster: Larry Hubble 13