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Thursday, March 21st, 2013
A warm welcome to our new members from all the ‘regulars’. What a good meeting!
We were once again treated to an excellent talk by James Fradgley, this time on the fascinating life cycle of the sun. What a lot of particle cookery is needed to keep us at just the right temperature. Thanks James, fascinating stuff well put.
Bill Read and I hope that our images of Comet Pan-STARRS will have inspired you to have a look for it when these clouds relent. And what about Bill’s great images of Ceres and Sylvia in the same frame. Another cracker Bill.
Thanks to Marvin Collins who came along to share his lucky observation of an object breaking up spectacularly on entry. Why wasn’t I in the right place at the right time? 
Next month is ‘Gadgets and Gizmos’ and we’ll also be having a telescope basics workshop, so do bring along your kit if you would like some help and advice.
Good luck with Pan-STARRS.
Ron
Pan-STARRS picture.
Thursday, March 14th, 2013
Check out Bill Read’s shot of Pan-STARRS in the gallery. It’s in the Spaceweather gallery too!
Messier Marathon
Friday, March 1st, 2013
Wells and Mendip Astronomers have invited CADAS members to a MM at Charterhouse Field Studies Centre on the Mendips. There will also be an introduction to the Charterhouse observatory. Event starts at 16:30 on Saturday 9 March.
Check the new Charterhouse Centre Observatory website for a full programme of events.
Ron
April beginners’ clinic.
Friday, February 22nd, 2013
If you’re not sure about setting up or getting the most from your telescope, then come along to our April meeting and if possible bring your scope. Along with our ‘gadgets and gizmos’ there will be a ‘beginners clinic’. All welcome!
February meeting
Thursday, February 21st, 2013
Greetings and welcome to our new members; it’s good to have you aboard. What an enjoyable meeting. Lots of variety and a great presentation by Bob Mizon. (What else!) Thanks to Arthur for his Sky Notes and to Adrian Zielonka for sharing those ‘UFO’ shots from Shapwick Heath. Hopefully the ‘U’ part can be dropped soon. Thanks also to Bud Budzinski and Bill Reed for their superb astronomical images. Now that so many people are queuing for their cups of tea we may soon have to cut another hatch in the kitchen wall!
Redstart School Chard
Saturday, February 2nd, 2013
What a great turnout for the The Redstart Primary School astronomy evening on Thursday 31st Jan.
Nick, Bud, Mike (Holland), Roger and Ron enjoyed meeting and chatting with parents and children about all things astronomical. Thanks for inviting us Redstart, it was an excellent evening.
StargazingLive Taunton racecourse.
Thursday, January 17th, 2013
What a successful and enjoyable event that was. It might have been wet but that didn’t seem to put people off; they just kept on coming. We and the other societies had a great chance to meet each other and to engage with the public. It was a nice bonus that the clouds finally broke allowing Jupiter to be viewed. Although the length of the queue was starting to get a bit worrying it all worked out fine.
The BBC organizers have asked me to thank everyone who helped on the day and I add my own thanks to you for helping to make this such a success.
Ron
moonlit-bill-reed
Wednesday, January 9th, 2013
[SinglePic not found]StargazingLIVE Discovery Night comes to Taunton Racecourse!
Saturday, December 22nd, 2012
Click to enlarge
Crewkerne and District Astronomical Society is part of the BBC Stargazing Live Discovery Night in Somerset. The free event at Taunton Racecourse runs from 4.30pm until 9.30pm on Thursday, 10th January 2013.
Visitors will be able to take part in a variety of activities aimed at families and those with a keener interest in astronomy. There will be two planetaria on site and the chance for children to help build a comet, make a solar system to scale and design an alien to live on another planet.
Star Storytellers will be using laser pens to describe the tales behind the constellations in the night sky and Dr Francisco Diego, the vice president of the UK Association for Astronomy Education, will be talking about supernovae and discussing just how old the universe could be as well as holding a series of question and answer sessions. We’ve chemistry of space shows, rocket building and a chance to explore the skies with our expert astronomers..and much much more.
Due to the popularity of the activities some of the events we will be ticketed on the evening. More details will be broadcast after Christmas on BBC Somerset 95.5FM/1566AM and available on our website and the Taunton Racecourse website at http://www.tauntonracecourse.co.uk/
(The Stargazing Live television programme returns to our screens on Tuesday 8th January 2013 on BBC2.)
Bill’s talk
Saturday, December 22nd, 2012
If anyone would like further information or help on the subject of the Prof’s talk on imaging, he would be happy to chat by email. For obvious reasons I won’t post his address here but you can contact me directly or via this website for it.
Ron