Ash Primary School 8 Feb ’17
9 February, 2017
Great evening with over 100 children and parents at Ash Primary School last night. We had 4 scopes on the go so the queues were not too long. Bud, Ken, Jan, Chris and Ron had a good time too.
Despite a lot of cloud, we had great views of Venus, Mars, and the moon and were treated to a bright overhead pass of the ISS which caused much excitement.
Thanks to the Chair of the PTA Jenny Bridge for inviting us and for the welcome drinks and snacks.
Adrian Zielonka’s February notes
26 January, 2017
Night Sky February 2017
Comet 45P Honda- Mrkos-Pajduskova - 11th at 8:00pm
Comet C/2015 V2 Johnson - 11th at 8:00pm
Arrhur Davis’ February 2017 Sky notes and Sky chart
23 January, 2017
January 2017 meeting
19 January, 2017
We had a great start to our year with this meeting. We welcomed several guests and it was good to help some of them get to grips with their telescopes.
Bob, Pete, Ron and Bill gave short talks on the theme of ‘How it moves’. Just to give a flavour of what was covered, topics included along the way, the relative motion of stars, the meaning of sidereal time, the discovery of exo-planets by the induced motion of their stars, and the use of the relatively new Polemaster to counteract the movement of the earth when imaging. We were left in no doubt that we live on a constantly wobbling and twitching planet amongst a sea of moving objects.
After the break, Bob presented his object(s) of the month in the constellation Monoceros and Arthur concentrated on the constellation Auriga.
Pete, Jan, Gordon and Bill finished off an enjoyable evening with some of their excellent images. Jan’s first deep sky shot taken of the Andromeda Galaxy using a 150-600 Sigma lens was really impressive.
Many thanks to all for helping set up and clear away and especially to Zena, Annabelle and Mike and the kitchen volunteers who did a great job.
At our next meeting on February 15th, Graham Bryant’s talk will be ‘Pluto; from myth to discovery and New Horizons.
Look forward to seeing you then.
Blue rich LEDs
8 January, 2017
Here’s a link to an interesting article about a legal ruling in the US against the use of blue rich LED lighting. Might it have implications for the Uk?
New Year Greetings!
29 December, 2016
A VERY HAPPY NEW YEAR TO ALL.
May your skies be still, dark, cloud free and transparent in 2017
A brief cometary note from Adrian Zielonka.
25 December, 2016
Comet 45Honda-Mrkos-Pajdusakova should begin to come visible with binoculars in the evening sky to the right of Venus. It’s currently at magnitude 9. It’s at perihelion (closest to the sun) on Dec 31st at a distance of 0.533 AU.
It should get much brighter than it is though comets are unpredictable though we do get a lot closer to it. Its current distance from us is 0.959 AU (Dec19). On the 31st it will be 0.703 AU from us. It will be at its closest to us on Feb10th at a distance of 0.084 AU in the constellation of Hercules.
(1.0 AU = 93million miles)
This evening at 5:00pm the comet will approximately be 10degrees to the right of Venus and 7degrees lower.
Each evening this month at the same time it will increase it’s distance towards the setting Sun.
See www.heavens-above.com for further details.