7 March 2006

I just found this Space.com story about the proposed impact of the ESA orbiter SMART-1 into the Moon on 1-2Sep06. Spacecraft to Slam into the Moon They say the likely impact area is Lacus Excellentiae and that it will be in daylight at the time so ground based observatories can observe it.

I booted up Virtual Moon Atlas to find out where Lacus Excellentiae is then set the ephemeris to 2Sep06 and by advancing the time to just shy of midnight UT (1900 EDT) I found that the area is just on the daylight side of the terminator. Checking Planetarium I find that the Moon transits that evening at 2033 EDT so it should be high in the sky and not yet into the Gegenschein as viewed from TotL. 2Sep06 is a Saturday.

Virtual Moon Atlas graphic

I think I would have preferred it to have occurred a day earlier when Lacus Excellentiae will be in shadow and any explosion of the remaining fuel might be easier to detect. But there is a lot of slop yet in the actual target area and date.

ESA SMART-1 web site

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A bit closer in is this ongoing (I think) project to document world-wide light-pollution.

Globe at Night.

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I just heard about this on a hamr radio broadcast where they were talking about radio propagation. 6-10Mar06 is Solar Week. It is primarily aimed at educating school children.

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Another find on the ham radio broadcast is The Space Report. It looks like this is mostly podcasts of current space news. It also appears to be the source of the Universe Today news articles.

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Observing Location	TotL
Observational Period	2015-2300 EST
Atmospheric Conditions	CSC says it will be clear with worse than average to average seeing tonight, but they say the RH will be 60-80% which would adversely effect transparency. Clear Sky Clock graphic NOAA is saying that it will be clear and cold but the humidity will only be in the 45-55% range which, although not great, would not have as much of an effect on transparency. Clear Sky Clock graphic When I went downtown the sidewalks were all wet. It hadn't rained and the humidity wasn't high enough for them to be getting wet that way. I think it is because they are all covered with salt from the last snow storm and it is drawing any moisture out of the air. But the air is noticeably moist and it felt raw even though it wasn't terribly cold. The wind was a little bothersome when it occasionally gusted. There were no obvious clouds and no pronounced ring around the Moon, but I think there was some light haze up there. I didn't observe any boiling on the limb of the moon. I think conditions were a little better than CSC had predicted, which is what I was expecting. Transparency Good Seeing Good
Instruments	Canon 15x50 Image Stabilized binoculars - Charlie Tacahashi 22x60 binoculars - Peter
Observing Party	Charlie Ridgway Peter Tagatac

I started out trying to observe the dimmer stars that I observed Sunday night and had trouble getting my bearings in Planetarium. I eventually got it figured out and located some of the stars but I just wasn't into it and never finished the task. I switched over to The Engagement Ring in UMi to identify the stars there and didn't finish that either. I looked at the Moon but didn't observe it. When I first got the binoculars out I noted a string of stars hanging below Mars (HIP 21341, HIP 21399, HIP 21442 and HIP 21436) but forgot to go back to them after I was all set up on the tripod and not doing any observing. Mostly Peter and I just talked.