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Saturday, August 13th, 2011
OK, hands up if anyone saw any Persieds this year. How different from the great time we had at the site in 2010! Ah well, can’t win them all.
What do astronomers get up to during a cloudy Spring?
Sunday, May 29th, 2011
Those of you who visit our little CADAS website may be wondering what on Earth has happened since that wondrous night at the start of April when a CADAS observing night coincided with a clear sky. Looking at the blog it would seem that nothing has been happening. Could this be true? It’s certainly the case that we seem to have had more than our fair share of clouds and, of course, the nights are getting shorter. But surely we can’t all be tucked up at home, with our cups of cocoa, reading Astronomy Now and playing with Stellarium?
So, fellow astronomers, how do you spend the cloudy Spring nights?
Observing at field 1st April
Saturday, April 2nd, 2011
Amazing. It was actually a clear night! Mike, Nick, Lorna, Dave and I spent a pleasant few hours viewing. Friends of Mike turned up too. Saturn worked its magic on them of course. Transparency wasn’t brilliant but it didn’t spoil our enjoyment. Someone who shall be nameless (but who’s name begins with R), forgot his counterweight. With the help of a mile of Mike’s gaffer tape and a convenient rock, the situation was saved. It was an impressive lashup! (Photographic evidence will be produced at the next meeting.) 
Martin Griffiths
Thursday, March 17th, 2011
Excellent talk by Martin on black holes last night was it not? We’ll certainly ask him back! Good to see so many people at the meeting and thanks to all who ‘volunteered’ to foster those books.
We still need a team for the quiz on 26th at Norman Lockyer. Please let me or know if you’d like to take part. It’s just a fun thing and Bob will be quiz master not Anne Robinson.
In case you haven’t spotted it, the CADAS ‘stargazing live’ events got a mention in this month’s Astronomy Now. Some of us are planning to meet at the field around 8.30 on April 1 or if cloudy the next evening. Why not join us.
Clear skies
NSEW Family Open Day at the Norman Lockyer Observatory
Monday, March 14th, 2011
I took Ella (4) and Sam (9) to the NSEW family open day at the Norman Lockyer Observatory today. Most of the domes were open and the old telescopes on display. Being the place where helium was discovered (by looking at emission lines from the sun) there was a sunny theme which was sadly not supported by the sun itself. It was so cloudy we actually left in mist.
Fortunately there was plenty to do. Students from Colyton Grammar School were there with experiments to do. We made (leaky) lava lamps, paper rockets, found out why we couldn’t pull two books apart and lost several Maltesers due to misdirected centrifugal forces.
The planetarium show, which was preceded by a great story teller, was great. We travelled to the North Pole, the equator and New Zealand, all from comfy seats near Sidmouth. It was all clearly explained by a very knowledgeable presenter.
As we all so often say, despite the weather, it was a grand day out.
Sunspot groups 9.3.11
Thursday, March 10th, 2011
Have just added a couple of images of recent sunspot activity to the gallery. Sun has had a lively few days!
Saturn
Thursday, March 10th, 2011
Another great shot to go with your Jupiter, Bud. Nice addition to the gallery.
Norman Lockyer Observatory visit
Friday, February 25th, 2011
As discussed at the last meeting, we have a visit to the Norman Lockyer Observatory coming up. The date has now been confirmed as Friday 25th March. The visit starts at 7.30pm. It would be good if we could share lifts – we’ll arrange all this at the meeting on the 16th.
If you would like to go and haven’t already let Arthur know, please could you get in touch with him? If you don’t have contact details for Arthur then use the form on this page.
An Exoplanet Atlas
Wednesday, February 23rd, 2011
Wired Magazine have a fantastic infographic about exoplanets. Beautifully done and very interesting. Make sure you look at it in full-screen mode.
Scale of the Universe
Tuesday, February 22nd, 2011
We’ve got a lot of links on our unoriginally named links page. So many in fact that I thought it might be useful to pick one out every now and then to highlight.
To begin, here’s one that’s just been added (with thanks to Ron for recommending it). It’s a simple (to look at, sure it wasn’t simple to do) sliding scale showing everything from quantum foam and the Planck length (10^-35m) to the estimated size of the universe (9 x 10^26m). You slide a control left and right to get a feel for the different sizes of things. It’s an interesting way to spend a couple of minutes and good for helping anyone understand the sheer size of things, as far as any of us is ever going to be capable of understanding it.