Astronomy

Astronomy related posts

January 2019 (Blood Moon) Lunar Eclipse

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This Sunday, January 20th, marks one of the major astronomical events for 2019 with a Total (Blood Moon) Lunar Eclipse.

One of the best things about this type of eclipse is that generally speaking 50% of the Earth will have visibility to it, including totality vs. a Total Solar Eclipse which viewers need to cram into a roughly 50 mile wide swath.

For this eclipse, North and South America will get the best show (weather permitting of course). The festivities will start on the 20th of January and traverse midnight into the 21st of January. For those on the East Coast the festivities will start off low-key at around 21:30 local time and really start picking up about an hour later with totality starting a little over an hour after that. For time-zones further West work back about an hour for each zone and you’ll wind up with roughly the right timing.

Lunar Eclipse at Totality – ~00:14 Eastern Local Time (Stellarium)
click for larger image

One of the better online resources you can visit for times is the Time and Date site (link: https://www.timeanddate.com/eclipse/). This site will allow you to easily view the timing of different phases of the eclipse for your specific location.

Assuming you have clear skies, this is an excellent event because you won’t need any special equipment to get some very real enjoyment out of it. And yes, for anyone who as not witnessed a total lunar eclipse, the moon will change color to a copper or red.

For those looking for more information, or to possibly check out other past and upcoming eclipses the NASA Goddard Space Flight Center publishes information about eclipses. Information about lunar eclipses, including the upcoming one (see chart below as well), can be found here: https://eclipse.gsfc.nasa.gov/lunar.html

NASA GFSC – https://eclipse.gsfc.nasa.gov/LEplot/LEplot2001/LE2019Jan21T.pdf
click for larger image or visit the original link

For those wondering why this might be. The red color is caused because the Earth is covering, and blocking, all of the direct sunlight that would normally shine on the Moon during its full phase. At the same time, light is still passing through the Earths’ atmosphere. The light that goes through the atmosphere is refracted which causes the shorter wavelengths of the spectrum (you know, that ROYGBIV thing you learned in school) to be directed at the surface of the moon. Resulting in the Red/Orange coloring on the moons surface. Just think of what it must look like facing the Earth from the surface of the Moon!

Of Comets, Planets, and Nebulae – Jupiter, M42 and Lovejoy

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A new image of Comet Lovejoy came through my queue yesterday afternoon from the BRT so I decided it was a great time (since it was clear) to give my scope another chance.

C2014-Q2-Lovejoy-CL-011015-2113e

I managed to finally get my new-to-me Meade LX-80 mount with 6" Meade Refractor (AR-6) to actually align properly. This resulted in a great observing session including Comet C/2014 Q2 Lovejoy, The Orion Nebula (M42) and the planet Jupiter. In addition to catching these great objects, I hooked up my Nikon D80 DSLR camera to it for some shots.

I've included a couple shots below and the full gallery link at the end of the post.

DSC_7862_lzn DSC_7864_lzn DSC_7889 DSC_7900

It was definitely a chilly night and the observing session ended when the scope was slewing to the Pinwheel Galaxy (so I could try a few shots there) and the power cord unplugged signaling a great time to call it a night.

In addition to the 3 main objects I managed to capture, the M42 shots include the surprise of several objects passing through the field of view. I suspect one of them is Japanese satellite AJISAI (EGS) but the others I wasn't able to identify before this post.

Catch the full gallery here: http://www.collegeastronomy.com/gallery/comet-q2-lovejoy-m42-jupiter/

Comet C2014 Q2 Lovejoy Update

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Comet Q2 is shaping up to be a nice little gem in the night sky. Unfortunately, my local skies have been cloudy and rainy since my initial post so I have not been able to snap a few local images. However, I managed to get another with the BRT on January 2nd which turned out quite nice. I've included it with this update below. While it's not very clear without over exposure, there is a thin tail coming off the comet that, in this image, protrudes toward the upper right corner of the frame.

C2014-Q2-Lovejoy-CL-010215-2114_1

For general viewing tips, please see my other article here: Holiday Comet 2014

Below you'll find a sky chart for where you can find the comet over the next several days. Be sure to check it out if you can!

CometQ2-Lovejoy-Jan5toJan13-Path

Holiday Comet 2014 – C2014 Q2 Lovejoy

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Once again we have the opportunity to catch view of a comet over the next several weeks. Comet C/2014 Q2 Lovejoy is making its way through the solar system. As you may have noticed, there are several other postings about a comet Lovejoy, this one is different. Typically comets are named for the person (or group) who discovered them and this is another in a series of discoveries by Terry Lovejoy, the 5th to date.

The picture below was taken using the BRT scope on a scheduled job that completed on December 25th. This is a black and white photo at 120 seconds of exposure with a narrow field camera. On over-exposing the image, the tail comes out but without the over-exposure, only the comets nucleus is clearly visible, seen as the bright spot of fuzz in the image below. The tail extends toward the upper right of the image. Another image is included later in the post.

C2014-Q2-Lovejoy-GX-122514-0108

This comet will make its way through the solar system toward the Sun and out without a return for another 8,000 years or so. The best chance to view it will be over the next few weeks as it gets brighter and brighter arriving at its closest distance to Earth on January 7th while it will continue to brighten through its closest encounter with the Sun on January 30th. However, by that time, the comet is expected to begin dimming from our view because of its distance from us (around 120 million miles away by that point).

The image below was also captured using the BRT array by another user who managed to catch a great shot using the camera designed for taking pictures of star clusters. Also taken on December 25th, this picture is also at 120 second exposure and in normal color.

C2014-Q2-Lovejoy-CL-122514-0044

Viewing Information & Tips

To view the comet, over the next several weeks you'll want to look in the general area below the constellation Orion the Hunter. As of this posting, the comet is about 13 degrees beneath the brightest, lower right hand star in Orion known as Rigel; a blue supergiant at 772 light years away. The comet is currently in the constellation Lepus the Rabbit and will be traveling upwards relative to the horizon night over night following a path that will take it beneath the constellation Taurus the Bull and The Pleiades open cluster. I have made a few charts which may help locate the comet, they are included below.

Comet Q2 has brightened faster than many anticipated and while the comet is visible to the naked eye currently at around a magnitude of 5 (naked-eye brightness is generally accepted to be anything below magnitude 6), if you have them, definitely use binoculars to get a good look as the comet isn't very easy to spot without a dark sky and good vantage point.

The best time to view the comet will be between around 10:30 PM and 1:30 AM local time as the comet will cross due South around Midnight reaching an altitude of around the 30 degree mark. For the next few days, Orion and the comet will rise at around the same time so if you have a great view of Orion, you can probably also look for the comet. Please remember that the comet will move quickly across the constellations in the sky so adjust your viewing over the next several days as it moves towards the constellation Taurus.

Click on the image below for a larger view of the comet path over the next 15 days.

CometQ2-Lovejoy-Dec14toJan15-Path

The Leo Cluster – Abell 1367

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I managed to use the BRT to snap a black and white deep sky picture of this group of galaxies. The Leo Cluster, otherwise designated as Abell 1367 is a part of the Coma Supercluster of galaxies and spans even more sky area than what I've captured here.  The cluster is around 330 million light years away and one of the closest clusters to our own. The cluster contains over 70 galaxies, not all of which are visible in this image. The expanse of the view field even contains some quasars, one of which is known to be over 10 billion light years away and due to expansion, traveling away from us at nearly a quarter of a million kilometers per second. Pretty amazing huh?

In the image, you should be able to see two spiral galaxies easily, one in the upper left which is edge on to us and another toward the upper right. Most of the other galaxies in the field are eliptical galaxies which appear as large fuzzy circular objects in the image, they represent the majority of the galaxies in this image field.

Below is a 300 by 300 thumbnail, click on the image for the full size version.

abell1367_030114