las meeting march 19 dr. paul bryans using comets as ......nightwatch: a practical guide to viewing...

LAS Newsletter – March 2015

Copyright © Longmont Astronomical Society, 2015. All rights reserved.

Celestial Highlights

Moon

Full moon: Mar 5 11:07 am

Third quarter: Mar 13 11:49 am New moon: Mar 20 3:37 am First quarter: Mar 27 01:44 am

Mercury

Mercury is visible low in the

southeastern morning sky in constellation Capricornus as the month begins. It moves to constellation Aquarius on Mar 10

and is visible until Mar 20. It brightens from magnitude 0.1 to -0.4 as its size degrees 6.7 to 5.4

arc sec across. It will reappear in the evening in mid-April.

Venus

Venus is prominent in the west

after sunset this month in the constellation Pisces. It moves to Aries on the 16th. It is mag -4 and it increases in apparent size from 12 to 14 arc sec across this month.

LAS Meeting March 19 – Dr. Paul Bryans

Using Comets as Solar Probes The guest speaker at the March meeting will be Dr. Paul

Bryans, High Altitude Observatory, NCAR in Boulder.

The EUV emission resulting from comets' passage through the solar atmosphere has opened many exciting avenues of

study. The observations show the sublimated cometary material to interact with ambient magnetic field and

highlight magnetic features that are not normally visible with EUV telescopes. In this talk, I will outline a model that

describes the interaction of the cometary atmosphere with the quiescent solar background and results in EUV emission.

After describing the emission process, I will go on to discuss

what we have learned about the corona from these observations and speculate on what else comets can teach

us about the Sun.

The meeting will be at the IHOP Restaurant, 2040 Ken Pratt Boulevard, Longmont. Please join us for coffee, dinner, or

just desert around 6 pm; The general meeting and presentation will begin at 7 pm.

Upcoming Events Volunteers and their telescopes are needed to support the Skyline High School astronomy class star party on Mar. 27th

8 pm at the Sandstone Visitor Center parking area.

M a r c h 2 0 1 5 - P a g e 2


Mars

Mars is visible below Venus; it is mag +1.3 in brightness and 4 arc sec across. It sets about 9 pm MDT.

Jupiter

Jupiter rises before sunset in the constellation Cancer. It is -2.5 magnitude in brightness and its apparent size is 44 arc sec across. Times to view or photograph the

“Great Red Spot” at mid transit this month: Mar 1 10:43 pm Alt 69° Mar 2 06:34 pm Alt 36° Mar 4 12:21 am Alt 57° Mar 2 06:34 pm Alt 36° Mar 4 08:12 pm Alt 56° Mar 5 01:59 am Alt 38° Mar 6 09:51 pm Alt 69° Mar 9 12:29 am Alt 62° Mar 9 08:20 pm Alt 51° Mar 11 02:07 am Alt 44° Mar 11 09:58 pm Alt 36° Mar 12 03:45 am Alt 24° Mar 13 11:37 pm Alt 66° Mar 14 07:28 pm Alt 45° Mar 16 01:51 am Alt 50° Mar 16 09:06 pm Alt 63° Mar 17 02:53 am Alt 30° Mar 18 10:45 pm Alt 69° Mar 20 12:23 am Alt 55°

Mar 21 08:15 pm Alt 59° Mar 23 02:02 am Alt 36° Mar 23 09:53 pm Alt 69° Mar 25 11:31 pm Alt 60° Mar 27 01:10 am Alt 42° Mar 28 09:01 pm Alt 68° Mar 29 02:48 am Alt 21° Mar 30 10:40 pm Alt 65° *GRS below 20° alt not shown

Saturn

Saturn is in the constellation Scorpio; it is mag +0.4 and 17 arc sec across. Saturn opposition with

Earth is May 22nd.

Library Telescope Program by Vern Raben, President

The LAS Board has decided to begin work developing a library telescope program which will be somewhat similar,

but on a much smaller scale, to what has been done by the New Hampshire Astronomical Society. The New Hampshire

club has placed 100 telescopes in participating libraries since 2008. See http://nhastro.com/ltp.php for short

summary of their program.

The concept is that the telescopes and other items would be purchased, modified by LAS, and then donated to a library.

Patrons of the library would check out the telescope kit as they do books and other media. The telescopes would be

periodically cleaned, adjusted, and maintained by LAS as

needed.

This is still a preliminary list but the following items would probably be included in the telescope kit:

Orion StarBlast 4.5” Altazimuth reflector telescope Orion EZ Finder for locating objects

Celestron zoom eyepiece Laminated instruction manual

NightWatch: A Practical Guide to Viewing the Universe by Terrence Dickinson

Moon map Headlamp

Carrying case, bag, or box

I’ve contacted the Longmont Library Director, Judith

Anderson, to see if the library would be interested in participating. Her response seems quite positive and she

will discuss the concept with the library leadership team. We will review this at March 19th business meeting and consider

the appropriate level of funding.

http://nhastro.com/ltp.php

M a r c h 2 0 1 5 - P a g e 3


Uranus

Uranus is in the constellation Pisces; it is mag 5.9 and 3.4 arc sec across. It won’t be visible after

the 28th; it will re-appear in the morning sky the last week of April.

Neptune

Neptune re-appears in the morning sky after March 17th in the

constellation Aquarius. It is apparent magnitude +8 and 2.2 arc sec across.

Comets

C/2014 Q2 (Lovejoy) remains in

good position in March. It didn’t dim as much predicted last month; it is magnitude +6 now and is expected to dim to magnitude 7 by months end. See chart on page 6.

Periodic comet 15P Finley is still visible but has dimmed to magnitude 11.7 and should be about magnitude 13 by months end.

Meteor Showers

No major showers this month.

Feb 19th LAS Meeting by Joe Hudson, Secretary

Forty-two people attended the February meeting of the Longmont Astronomical Society. Vern Raben announced the

agenda for the meeting and introduced the club board and officers: himself (President), Gary Garzone (Vice President),

Michael Fellows (Treasurer / ALCor), Joe Hudson (Secretary), Brian Kimball (Member-at-large), Jim Elkins

(Member-at-large), and Tally O'Donnel (Member-at-large). Vern also greeted 5 first time visitors.

Announcements:

Volunteers needed for March 27th Skyline High School astronomy club star party.

The speaker at the March 19th meeting will be Dr. Paul Bryons from HAO. Paul's expertise is in solar

spectroscopy. He will speak about his research utilizing sun grazing comets to study the solar corona.

Presentation – Observing the Moon

The presentation was “Observing the Moon” by Andrew

Planck. Andrew has been an enthusiastic amateur astronomer for over 50 years and a regular volunteer at the

Little Thompson Observatory for the past ten years. He is a retired middle school teacher and is an accomplished

musician whose diverse musical skills include the piano, autoharp, didgeridoo, musical spoons, alphorn, and

Highland bagpipe. Andrew was the Pipe Major of the award winning City of Denver Bagpipe Band for 12 years

After some personal introduction, Andrew described his efforts in retirement writing the recently published guide to

observing the moon. Andrew discussed the Little Thompson Observatory and the 60,000 visitors the LTO has had since

1999. Visitors can directly enjoy the 18 and 24 inch scopes through a very simple reservation system. Andrew strongly

encouraged LAS to take advantage of this local treasure: simply go to Starkids.org, look for an empty date, grab 1-15

friends, build a group observing list, show up at LTO, give the volunteer your list, and sit back and enjoy. Andrew

M a r c h 2 0 1 5 - P a g e 4


described the contribution of Mt Wilson's 24 inch scope to

the Little Thompson observatory, which NASA had used to

perform infrared surveys of the lunar surface to survey Apollo landing spots, looking for firm, smooth surface versus

possible dust traps.

Andrew opened his discussion of lunar observation by quoting Werner Heisenberg “Not only is the Universe

stranger than we think, it is stranger than we can think”, and in swift manner, laid open the 13.8 Billion year Big

Bang to Now story of the continual production of the heavier elements on the periodic table by through stellar evolution.

So where did the moon come from? Shortly after the earth

formed, a 'mars' sized object struck the body and flung off the rubble that later coalesced to become the moon. And

the light and dark areas on the moon? The assembling

moon was in a molten state where the heavy elements sank towards the core, leaving the both physically lighter and

visually lighter materials prominently in view. Later asteroid strikes then disturbed surface, opening up cracks in that

allowed subsurface molten center (dark colored areas are the resulting eruptions). Forming the illusions of the Man in

the Moon, The Lady in the Moon, the Witch, the Beatle, the Rabbit, etc. Andrew went on to explain why early

assumptions of similarity led to naming large dark areas ''seas'. Dark areas were initially called 'seas' as they were

assumed to be liquid filled; the different classifications of craters and features common to type and the model of wave

mechanics that a water drop affords; as well as rills, rifts, tubes, and valleys.

Andrew made signed copies of his book available for purchase.

Business Meeting

Mike Fellows gave the treasurer’s report for February. As of

the Feb. meeting, 52 members have paid dues for 2015 which is running ahead last year at this time. He gave the

current account balances for the month.

Tools and Techniques – Photoshop actions and scripting by Vern

Like any other hobby, this one requires capabilities with tools and techniques... tonight some of the capabilities of a

M a r c h 2 0 1 5 - P a g e 5


tool used by many imagers, Photoshop.

Photoshop “Actions” The “actions” menu is not obvious, you need to activate by

selecting “Windows menu->actions”. Summary: Do you have a repetitive series of actions to take

on a set of images? You can use “Actions” to record a sequence of functional actions (commands) and then repeat

those actions on other images. Scripts can also be used to load all images in a directory and call then call those same

“actions” to process in an identical manner.

Of note was the Picture Merge function – actions that stitches together all series of separate photographs of a

larger panorama, i.e. crescent moon example shown.

General discussion topics:

Perhaps we should consider one-on-one mentoring program

for newly interested. Vern says the group tried star parties for beginners in the past but the program was primarily

defined by its 'no shows’. Perhaps a one-on-one approach would work better?

The LAS parent organization, “the Astronomical League” is

suggesting that member clubs set up a library program similar to what has been done by the New Hampshire club.

Vern said the LAS Board was considering this had not made a decision. (See page 5 above for update -- VR).

What is the status of the proposed Observatory at Sandstone? Vern says that it is not been active at all... a

concept plan was submitted to the City of Longmont over a year ago. City says they are reviewing but no active

consideration or study is appears to be underway. For all intents and purposes the proposal appears to be dead.

Club telescopes sharing plan needs work: group's current

lending program to members should be reviewed and updated to enhance both the circulation and trusted control

over the assets of the group. Vern would bring the topic to the LAS exec committee for their guidance.

M a r c h 2 0 1 5 - P a g e 6


Position of Comet C/2014 Q2 (Lovejoy) in March 2015

Date Time RA(Ap) Dec (Ap)

Mar 1 07:17p 01h31m56.6s +55°18'15"

Mar 2 07:18p 01h31m15.4s +55°40'49"

Mar 3 07:18p 01h30m36.6s +56°03'08"

Mar 4 07:19p 01h30m00.1s +56°25'12"

Mar 5 07:21p 01h29m25.9s +56°47'04"

Mar 6 07:22p 01h28m53.9s +57°08'44"

Mar 7 07:25p 01h28m24.0s +57°30'15"

Mar 8 08:26p 01h27m56.1s +57°51'34"

Mar 9 08:27p 01h27m30.2s +58°12'44"

Mar 10 08:28p 01h27m06.3s +58°33'46"

Mar 11 08:29p 01h26m44.2s +58°54'43"

Mar 12 08:30p 01h26m24.0s +59°15'33"

Mar 13 08:31p 01h26m05.5s +59°36'17"

Mar 14 08:32p 01h25m48.7s +59°56'58"

Mar 15 08:33p 01h25m33.5s +60°17'35"

Date Time RA (Ap) Dec (Ap)

Mar 16 08:34p 01h25m20.0s +60°38'09"

Mar 17 08:35p 01h25m08.0s +60°58'41"

Mar 18 08:36p 01h24m57.4s +61°19'11"

Mar 19 08:38p 01h24m48.3s +61°39'41"

Mar 20 08:38p 01h24m40.6s +62°00'10"

Mar 21 08:39p 01h24m34.2s +62°20'40"

Mar 22 08:40p 01h24m29.1s +62°41'10"

Mar 23 08:42p 01h24m25.2s +63°01'42"

Mar 24 08:43p 01h24m22.5s +63°22'15"

Mar 25 08:44p 01h24m20.9s +63°42'50"

Mar 26 08:45p 01h24m20.4s +64°03'28"

Mar 27 08:46p 01h24m20.9s +64°24'08"

Mar 28 08:47p 01h24m22.4s +64°44'51"

Mar 29 08:48p 01h24m24.8s +65°05'38"

Mar 30 08:48p 01h24m28.2s +65°26'28"

Mar 31 05:24a 01h24m35.2s +65°54'51"

M a r c h 2 0 1 5 - P a g e 7


Our Night Sky March 15 at 10 pm

M a r c h 2 0 1 5 - P a g e 8


Aurora image by Paul Robinson

taken in southern Montana (4 miles west of Lodge Grass, MT

on March 1st).

M a r c h 2 0 1 5 - P a g e 9


M33, the Triangulum Galaxy by Brian Kimball

M a r c h 2 0 1 5 - P a g e 10


Wide field image of comet C/2014 Q2 (Lovejoy), the

Double Cluster, and the Heart and Soul Nebula by David Elmore from Sunspot, NM.

M a r c h 2 0 1 5 - P a g e 11


Horsehead and Flame Nebula by Gary Garzone

las meeting march 19 dr. paul bryans using comets as ......nightwatch: a practical guide to viewing...

Documents