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Rochester, Minnesota


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Observe Titan shadow transits

This year 2025, we still have a unique opportunity to observe Titan’s shadow passing across Saturn’s disk as we learned at the last members’ meeting from Bob Fealey. Below is an adapted table taken from Sky and Telescope. For mid transits, there are links to Saturn in stellarium-web.org , opens in new tab. Upcoming Titan shadow transits (UT/CDT) Date DoW […]
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Sun at RochesterFest

A public observation of the Sun at RochesterFest was planned for Tuesday 6/24 and for Saturday 6/28. Tuesday 6/24 we planned a public observation of the Sun at RochesterFest from 5 to 7 p.m. Actually, 2025 was the first year that RAC participated in RochesterFest. We were pleasantly surprised by the organizers, who provided transportation for our telescopes and other […]
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Comet C/2023 A3 (Tsuchinshan-ATLAS)

Comet C/2023 A3 (Tsuchinshan-ATLAS) has indeed become very observable with the naked eye after all. It can be photographed quite well with smartphones. Of course, a camera with a larger aperture provides a better image, not to mention the quality lenses. How to find the comet in the sky is described quite well in the Sky and Telescope article  Comet […]
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Root River Park 2024

Root River Park is located south of Rochester and is owned by Olmstead County. It is a small but pretty park adjacent to the North branch of the Root river. Rochester residents don’t use this park much and that’s a shame. However, this park is beneficial to amateur astronomers. The sky is dark enough to observe faint objects on a […]
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Aurora on May 10, 2024

The night of Friday, May 10, was the first night for club members under the dark skies of Eagle Bluff after a long winter. To our surprise, it wasn’t even dark yet and already we saw something very special – the Northern Lights, and even in the south. A few minutes later, while it was still dusk, the International Space […]
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Total Eclipse 2024

Did you observe the last total solar eclipse on April 8? Do you have valuable photos, video or notes? Perhaps they are suitable for submission and certification by the Astronomical League. Here is the information you need for submission: Location of the observer’s site, including longitude and latitude* Date and time of the observations (either UT or local time)* Instrument […]

Submitted Photos

Forums RAC Main Forum General Discussion Congratulations Jack! Re: Congratulations Jack!

#13003
jlmanatee
Participant

    Thanks Jeff,
      I miss you folks.  I've been busy this year and just have not gotten around to coming to meetings (I need to re-up my membership too!).  I'm hoping to get down to the Star-B-Q this year.  Will it be Friday, Sept. 30th or Oct. 1st?
      This past weekend I was able to camp out Friday and Saturday on  a farm south of Rushford.  It was awesomely dark and remote.  I got beautiful images of the Cocoon Nebula.  http://www.astrobin.com/262843/
      I also got images of the Cresent Nebula, but those were a little disappointing.  Earlier this summer I went to the Nebraska Star Party, but I only had one good night of imaging there.  Still, it was fun.