Activity

Nice M81 and M82 and Pleiades Rob! Did you get those while at Eagle Bluff?

I thought our members might be interested in a picture I took today in Boca Chica State Park in Texas. Yup it’s SpaceX’s Starship at it’s launch site, hopefully awaiting launch this week. Unfortunately I’ll be on the road returning to MN and not able to stay for the…[Read more]

It was a great night! I got 77 x 30s exposures of M81 and M82, with somewhat less time and worse tracking on the Pleiades. My initial stacks + stretches are below, but I would like to eventually try using siril and starnet++ to bring out the galaxies and reflection nebula without fattening the stars.

I’m looking forward to it! It will be my first time at Eagle Bluff.

<p style=”text-align: left;”>I am heading down now to get some solar viewing in.</p>

Darn, I’m in Texas until the 14th so I won’t be able to come. (I might get to see STARSHIP launch #3 however as I am 45 min. from Starbase in Mission TX.)
I did get some images the other night of 12P Pons-Brook below M32 and above Alpheratz. Could see it in a 7 power finder and looked interesting in the 80mm refractor and photographed well.
Also…[Read more]

Looking forward to it.

Early evening we should be able to see comet 12P/Pons-Brooks under M31 Andromeda.

It has been way too long since I’ve been to eagle bluff. I will be there for sure.

Jeff, could you or someone at Eagle Bluff take some photos of this gathering and send them to me via email.  I had surgery this week and hence bed ridden. It would be for our newsletter.

Eagle Bluff right now is a go for Saturday night.  John got word from Eagle Bluff and they said it was OK.  Anyone interested, come on out on Saturday.

Is Eagle Bluff available this weekend?  It looks like Saturday (Friday?) may be a great time to go there and do a Messier Marathon.  If not a marathon, time to get together for some observing.

Starlink 1176 was launched on January 29, 2020 from Air Force Eastern Test Range, Cape Canaveral FL

Thanks Josef. I did use Stellarium as you mentioned and aligned my photo with the position of M82 and M81 in Stellarium at the approximate time of photo. At 7:40 pm StarLink # 1176 passed through the field of view at the same angle as indicated on the photo! As above I don’t know if this caused the stacking process to ignore subsequent images.

If you know time of the image(s) set that time at https://stellarium-web.org/skysource/Bode'sGalaxy?fov=4.7939&date=2024-02-29T02:10:34Z&lat=44.08&lng=-92.51&elev=0 and you may see that satellite passing by.

M81and M82 plus a StarLink (?) trail from a cold last night in the observatory. After the satellite passed the stacking routine began to ignore frames so I stopped the stacking at 155 frames with 70 ignored! Don’t know if the satellite streak made that happen or not.

Most likely I was able to see 8 mag comet 12P/Pons-Brooks by 10×50 binocular from light polluted backyard.
See at stellarium-web.org .