November 2007 - Utah-Astronomy - mailman.xmission.com

M57 +73PSW-3
by daniel turner 27 Mar '13

27 Mar '13

Mark your calendar for early evening May 7. Their will be a close encounter between the Ring nebula and periodic comet 73P. The comet will be close to earth so its exact position in the sky will depend stongly on your location on the globe. Go to spaceweather.com and use the link at the bottom of the page for "Observable Comets". 73p is in the list and includes orbital elements and a link for daily ephemerides. DT __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around http://mail.yahoo.com

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OT: Sports cars
by Chuck Hards 09 Feb '08

09 Feb '08

Just wondering if any other astro list members share my interest in sports cars and roadsters. I'm not talking about "point and shoot" horsepower muscle cars, but cars that go fast yet were designed for curves. Cars that were meant to be driven on the open road and enjoyed for the driving experience. Some examples would include the MG midget, the Triumph Spitfire, TR6 or TR7, Toyota 2000 GT, Jaguar XK-E series, Datsun 1600, 2000, or 240Z, Mazda RX-7, Miata, RX-8. Anybody?

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Comet 17P - Utah astro wiki event moved to new page
by Kurt Fisher 30 Nov '07

30 Nov '07

Like the comet, the utah astro wiki calendar page entry for Comet 17P Holmes has become bloated. So I moved that topic to its own wiki page at: http://www.utahastronomy.com/Comet_17P_Holmes_2007 This new location for Comet 17P news is also linked off the main calendar page at: http://www.utahastronomy.com/Current_observing_events - Kurt _______________________________________________ Sent via CSolutions - http://www.csolutions.net

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Obs rep: Comet 17P Holmes 11-29
by Kurt Fisher 29 Nov '07

29 Nov '07

While taking an exercise walk down Millcreek Road at dusk this evening, I had about 15 minutes to observe Comet Holmes naked-eye with a semi-dark mag 4.75 sky, no Moon and during a brief cloudless window. The comet is a plainly and easily seen, but is now a faint mag 3-4 disk larger in diameter than the disk of the Moon. It is unmistakeable once you know where to look. The comet is about 1 deg from alf Per - Mirfak - on a PA of about 225 degs from Mirfak. On first glance, you might mistake it for a white cloud patch, but that big fuzzy spot is a comet. Once I got back to the car and as the clouds were moving in, I also took a quick look with 10x50 binos to confirm the sighting. In binos the bloated coma and central jet can be made out. I have no guess as to how it would look from a light polluted urban located. - Kurt _______________________________________________ Sent via CSolutions - http://www.csolutions.net

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Science Movie Night
by Patrick Wiggins 28 Nov '07

28 Nov '07

I'll be hosting next Tuesday's Utah Museum of Natural History Science Movie Night in the main floor auditorium of the Salt Lake City public library, 210 East 400 South. Tuesday's movie, Roving Mars, is a documentary covering the design, launch and landings of NASA's robotic Mars rovers Spirit and Opportunity. The movie will run from about 6:45 to 7:30. After the movie I'll present an update on current Mars exploration and then open things up to discussion. If there's interest we'll then head off to a nearby eatery (any suggestions?) for snacks and socializing. See you there, patrick

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Blinking challenges
by Patrick Wiggins 28 Nov '07

28 Nov '07

After seeing only two of the pictures I took the first night I started chasing my recent find, Joe emailed to say he thought he saw something else moving in the pictures besides my find and the bright asteroid in the middle. Joe, I'm surprised you picked up on that. You must have sharp eyes. :) While there was something else moving it was not a real object (Darn, there went Comet Bauman...). Ghost images, cosmic ray hits and "Kodak stars" (name comes from the days of searches using film) do complicate things a bunch. I'm just glad the software somehow takes that into account so I don't chase too many wild geese. At any rate, since Joe saw it and was curious I thought others might be too. So I've taken all nine pictures I shot that night and aligned them so if one moves through them quickly everything (real or not) that moves between frames becomes immediately evident. You will note that "movers" are not necessarily in every frame of the "movie". I intentionally do things to the camera during these sessions that will tend to make most Kodak stars disappear in some of the frames, thereby illuminating them as real targets. The 3.5 MB file can be downloaded from: http://users.wirelessbeehive.com/~paw/temp/JOE.ZIP I left the pictures in the same FIT format they came out of the camera since that's a universal format for CCD imaging. If you can't open them let me know and I'll see about converting them to TIF or JPG. patrick

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Nov Slas meeting lecture on Einstein - followup urls
by Kurt Fisher 28 Nov '07

28 Nov '07

Based on this month's SLAS lecture, I added to the Utah astro wiki current observing events calendar - links to two of Einstein's miracle year papers at: http://www.utahastronomy.com/Current_observing_events#Dec_All_-_Re_November… I also added some discussion and links to a few papers on superluminal expansion of the universe in follow-up to Ziggy's question during the meeting on "Why can't I see the edge of the Big Bang Universe?" or "If the universe is 13.4 billion years old, why isn't the universe a spherical space 26.8 billion light-years in diameter?" "If I am not exactly at the Big Bang center, why can't I see the edge?" Finally, I typed up some notes on the relationship between Orson Pratt's 1866 major work _The Key to the Universe_, the 1887 Michelson-Morley experiment and Einstein's theory of relativity. Those notes are available privately on request. - Kurt _______________________________________________ Sent via CSolutions - http://www.csolutions.net

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Re: [Utah-astronomy] Use of center SPOC room over winter season
by Kurt Fisher 26 Nov '07

26 Nov '07

Thanks Patrick. I'll call Bruce. Would you bring it up at the next transitional board meeting? - Kurt _______________________________________________ Sent via CSolutions - http://www.csolutions.net

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Utah astro wiki observing events calendar for Dec is up
by Kurt Fisher 26 Nov '07

26 Nov '07

See http://www.utahastronomy.com/Current_observing_events - Kurt _______________________________________________ Sent via CSolutions - http://www.csolutions.net

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Use of center SPOC room over winter season
by Kurt Fisher 26 Nov '07

26 Nov '07

Hi, I'm planning out my winter astronomy activities. Would the board consider the use of SPOC for this purpose over the winter season? I don't really have a good home location to set up a scope outside and to run the scope from inside my house. Street lamps and one scope paranoid do-goody in the neighborhood are limitations. Repeaters and new blue-tooth connectors now make it possible set a scope up outside in the cold and run it from inside. But power becomes a limitation with extras like dew heaters and a heater pad for the mount. It would helpful to be able to use the center control room of SPOC and its "Henchie holes" for such winter observing. A small electric room heater (which I am happy to loan to SLAS) would bring the temperature of the center control room up to useable levels while power cords and USB cords can be run to a scope on the south or north sides of the building. - Kurt _______________________________________________ Sent via CSolutions - http://www.csolutions.net

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