Observing Log for Friday 21 October

What a fabulous night with clear skies and delightfully cool fall air. Below is a summary of what we observed last night.

• Jupiter : Heat coming off the roof made the image a little fuzzy, but we were able to make out cloud bands on the planet as well as all four Galilean satellites- Io, Ganymede, Europa, and Callisto.
• Saturn : Saturn looked lovely and we were easily able to see the moon Titan. Rhea, Dione, and Tethys were fainter, but also visible.
• M57 (the Ring Nebula): This fine example of a planetary nebula appeared as a delicate smoke-ring in the eyepiece of the 8-inch scope.The Ring Nebula is located in the constellation of Lyra and is about 2,300 light-years from Earth. Planetary nebulae are the remnants of lower mass stars (like our Sun) after they've used up their nuclear fuel.
• M31 (Andromeda Galaxy): We looked at the Andromeda Galaxy in the 14-inch. This object is a neighboring galaxy located about 2.5 million light-years from us. It's a spiral galaxy like our own Milky Way, but it's larger. M31 is about 220,000 light-years across compared to the Milky Way's 100,000 light-year diameter. Through the telescope M31 looked like a small fuzzy ball with a star-like center. The bright center is the core of M31 and the fuzziness is the light from the hundreds of billions of stars that make up the galaxy.
• The Albireo System: Through the 8-inch, we observed this double-star in Cygnus. The stars of Albireo (one blue, one gold) can't be resolved with the naked eye, but through our telescopes we are able to see the pair. The brighter yellow star is also a binary system, but these two stars are two close for our telescopes to resolve. Albireo is about 430 light-years distant.
• NGC 6826 (the "blinking planetary"): NGC 6826 is planetary nebula located in the constellation of Cygnus. It's called the blinking planetary because when you have it centered in the eyepiece, it appears to blink "on" when you look away from it and "off" when you look directly at it. The effect happens because our peripheral vision is more sensitive than our forward vision.

Sincere thanks to Stacey and Harold for making the evening a success!

And as always, thank you to everyone who attended. Your presence and enthusiasm fill me with happiness.

Observing log for Friday 2 August 2019

Yay! We were able to open! The weather last night turned out to be far better than what was forecast. Here's what we were able to see:

Through the 14-inch scope

• Albireo: Albireo is a double star system in Cygnus. The two stars (one blue, one gold) can't be resolved with the naked eye, but through our telescopes we are able to see the pair. The system is about 430 light-years distant.
• M13 (the Hercules cluster): We also looked at the globular cluster, M13. M13 can be found in the constellation of Hercules and is about 22,000 light-years from Earth. There are about 150-160 globular clusters located in the halo of our galaxy. These clusters contain some of the oldest stars in the Milky Way.
• M57 (the Ring Nebula): M57 can be found in the constellation of Lyra and is located about 2,300 light-years from Earth. Planetary nebulae are the remnants of lower mass stars after they've used up their nuclear fuel. The Ring Nebula appeared as a delicate smoke-ring in the eyepiece.
• NGC 6826 (the "blinking planetary"): NGC 6826 is a another planetary nebula, but this one is located in the constellation of Cygnus. It's called the blinking planetary because when you have it centered in the eyepiece, it appears to blink "on" when you look away from it and "off" when you look directly at it. The effect happens because our peripheral vision is more sensitive than our forward vision.

Through the 8-inch scope

• Jupiter : We were able to make out cloud bands on the planet and the four Galilean satellites- Io, Europa, Ganymede, and Callisto.
• Saturn : The lovely ringed planet also made an appearance.

Sincere thanks to Iadviga and Ryan for their assistance with the event.

And of course, an astronomically-sized thank you to everyone for attending! I loved all the enthusiasm and the great questions.

Observing log for Friday 20 July 2018

The clouds held off...at least for a little while!

Here's what we managed to sneak in:

• The Moon was delightful through the 14-inch, being just a day past first quarter.
• We also observed Jupiter and Saturn through both the 14-inch and 8-inch scopes.
• I think at least a few folks got to see Venus through the 8-inch before it was lost to clouds.
• The beautiful double star Albireo showed up nicely through both scopes. Even with the clouds, the difference in color between the two Albirio A and Albirio B was apparent.
• Deep sky objects were out of the question, but I did make an earnest attempt to show NGC 6826, "the blinking planetary" before we closed up. I thought I could (maybe) see it, but the clouds had taken over by then.

Once again, big thanks to Maryam and Iadviga their assistance with the event.

And of course, thanks to everyone for attending and asking such great questions! I absolutely loved the enthusiasm of the kids, and wow, I was super impressed with their astronomical knowledge. You all make doing these events such a pleasure! :)

Observing log for 30 June 2017

The towering cumulus clouds stayed southwest of Rockville and the sky cleared! Seeing wasn't great, but we did manage to observe the following objects:

• A first quarter Moon
• The planet Jupiter
• The planet Saturn
• The globular cluster M13, (the Hercules cluster)
• The planetary nebula M57 (the Ring Nebula) located in the constellation Lyra
• Another planetary nebula, NGC 6826 (the "blinking planetary") located in the constellation Cygnus
• The double star Albireo, also located in Cygnus

Overall, not a bad night. Thank you everyone for your patience with the weather and the fantastic questions. It's an honor to get to share the observatory and night sky with you.

Upcoming events, guest night recap, and some links

Yesterday evening was our last official observatory guest night of the season, but there are a couple of other upcoming events that we'll be participating in:

This coming Monday 19 October, we'll be hosting a satellite event for the 2015 White House Astronomy Night at the Montgomery College Planetarium on the Takoma Park / Silver Spring campus. Details are here. Dr. Harold Williams and I will be there with students from MC's Engineering and Science Adventure Club and the MC Stargazers.

On Saturday 14 November we will be bringing a couple of our telescopes to the Croydon Creek Nature Center for a star party. To register, go to events (menu on the right-hand side of the screen), and then scroll through the dates until you get to 14 November.

Here is a recap of what we observed last night:

Through the 14-inch scope

• Albireo (double star in Cygnus)
• M57 (planetary nebula in Lyra)
• M31 (Andromeda Galaxy)
• NCG 6826 (The "blinking planetary" in Cygnus)

Through the 8-inch scope

• Waxing crescent Moon
• M13 (Hercules globular cluster)
• Epsilon Lyrae (a multiple star system in Lyra)

Last night I recommended several astronomical links to different folks. First, here's the link to the planetarium software package Stellarium. Stellarium is free and operates on Windows, Mac, and Linux. I've used it on all three platforms without issue. There is a mobile version ($2.49, last time I checked) as well.

I also use the website Heavens Above for astronomical and satellite data.

Finally, the US Naval Observatory's Data Services page is a fantastic resource and one I use frequently.