| Observing Location | TotL |
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| Observational Period | 1600-1630 EST |
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| Atmospheric Conditions |
Conditions were great for making the observation. It is just that the Sun and Moon were in the wrong place to be observed from this location.
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| Instruments | SAR: Coulter CT-100 Newtonian reflector w/Baader AstroSolar filter film
- Charlie
Canon 15x50 IS binocular w/Baader AstroSolar filter film - Charlie
the binoculars were intended for sweeping the sky hoping to bump into the crescent Moon but since the sun was already setting as I was setting up I never got a chance to take it out. |
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| Observing Party | Charlie Ridgway
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I had put off solar observing this morning figuring I would do it right before looking for the moon. That turned out to have been a mistake. I was at the library and left 90 minutes before sunset figuring that would give me plenty of time to make it up to the park and get set up before sunset and moonset. There is a bus stop right across the street from the library that would drop me off a couple of blocks closer to the park than the subway does. I know it is faster to get places on the subway, particularly around holiday times, but I took the bus anyway, and a local bus at that. That turned out to have been a tactical error. It took forever to get uptown with all the traffic and stops. By the time I got to the park the sun was very low. And it was much farther down in the SW than I am used to seeing it. I entered the park at 79 St figuring I would find a place to observe while walking up from the SE corner of the lawn. But when I got there the only splashes of Sun on the lawn were all up at the NE corner so I had to race up there. By the time I got there the sun was setting into the Timer-Warner building. By the time I got all set up the Sun was almost all the way behind the buildings. I moved over to the top of the lawn, TotL proper, in case the sun came out from behind the buildings before setting but really knew it wouldn’t. I was never able to locate the sun in the solar filter but did find a couple of pin pricks in the coating that need to be patched.
| Observing Location | TotL |
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| Observational Period | 1645-2330 EST |
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| Atmospheric Conditions |
| Cloud Cover | Broken Cloud (50-70%)
becoming
Overcast |
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| Temperature | Hugh 30s |
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| Wind | Light Breeze from NE |
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| Humidity | Moderate |
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| Feels Like | Raw |
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When I left the park at 1630 EST there were a few light clouds low on the SE horizon that were glowing salmon. By the time I got back 2 1/4 hours later there was a N-S stripe of cloud padding through the zenith. It moved west a bit then backed up a bit and finally moved into NJ only to be followed by more clouds. Conditions were tolerable until around 220 EST when the only stars visible were near zenith and not many there. The conditions were better than forecast by CSC but not as good as forecast by the other weather forecast services. They were about average for TotL.
| Transparency | Fair becoming Poor |
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| Seeing | Good |
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| Instruments | SAR: Coulter CT-100 Newtonian reflector - Charlie
SAR seemed to be better behaved than usual tonight; or maybe I am becoming more resigned to its defects. The TeleVue/Daisy Red Dot Finder went on and required only a minor adjustment to get it aligned with the scope. I wondered at the time if that was a good omen or bad. The tails on the stars didn't seem objectionable so I guess it was a good omen. The lady tile I had the scope out I noticed that at least one of the screws holding the truss bar shoe onto the primary cage was loose so tonight I tightened it up again. I don't know what that did to my collimation. To even check the other screw I am going to have to remove the primary mirror so am going to pass on that for the time being.
Canon 15x50 IS binocular - Charlie
I had the binocular but brought it primarily to aid in trying to find the Moon and never isrd it.
Coulter CT-100 Newtonian reflector - Peter
By the time Peter arrived the clouds were thickening and he never got the scope out.
Nikon CoolPix 995 - Peter
Celestron 7x50 binocular - Kin
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| Observing Party | Charlie Ridgway
Peter Tagatac
Kin Lee
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| Target | NGC457, Owl Cluster, ET Cluster |
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| Constellation | Cas |
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| Category | DSO: OCl |
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| Time | 20061121.1935 EST |
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| Comments | The owl was laying on his side, body extended to right. At 21x I could see the upper hand and lower foot. At 43x he filled about half of the FoV and more stars were visible in the body. |
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| Target | the Pleiades, M45 |
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| Constellation | Tau |
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| Category | DSO: OCl |
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| Time | 20061121.2100 EST |
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| Comments | I counted naked-eye the usual six Pleiade tonight.
- Alcyone, +2.86 (winking)
- Merope, +4.17
- Electra, +3.70
- Maia, +3.86
Taygeta,0+4.29 (winking)
- Celaeno,+5.44
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| Target | Hyades, Mel25 |
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| Constellation | Tau |
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| Category | Asterism |
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| Time | 20061121.2112 EST |
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| Comments | I was listening to a vintage edition of Sky at Night from one of the cover CDs and a very young Patrick Moore was yakking about the Pleiades and asking people to count then and send him a post card with their results. He then went on TD describe the Hyades which he says is a legitimate star cluster although it is not listed in my Deep Sky Observer's Guide and doesn't have a Messier, NGC, Caldwell or any other prominent star catalog number that I have been able to find (I did find a Melote catalog number for it). It is a large cluster, as large as the stick figure of the constellation Equuleus and nearly as big as Delphinus. Aldeberan however, is not part of the cluster. It is only half as far away from earth as the stars of the cluster. All of the cluster stars appear kind of blue-white while Aldeberan is a golden-yellow. |
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| Target | 2006/ (SWAN) |
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| Constellation | Aql |
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| Category | Comet/Asteroid/Meteor |
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| Time | 20061121 EST |
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| Comments | I think I found this comet. SpaceWesther says that it has dropped to Mag 7 as it heads back to deep space never to intersect Earth's orbit again. Tonight I entered the orbital elements into Planetarium but it was putting the comet on the wrong side of Altair from where I remembered it should be so I didn't even bother looking for it until I had confirmed my entries against Kin's downloaded elements. By then it was down right over the tree line. There was an object not in Planetarium that was the appropriate brightness relative to the stars shown.
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| Target | (7) Iris |
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| Constellation | Ari |
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| Category | Comet/Asteroid/Meteor |
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| Time | 20061121 EST |
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| Comments | Not Seen
I hopped into the neighborhood and confirmed the location with Kin's copy of Planetarium which has a deeper sky catalog but was unable to identify which point of light it might be. Doing everything up-side-down to what I am used to doesn't help me in star hopping when there is a lot of space between bright stars. |
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