Texas Star Party '11 - Part 2

While this year's Texas Star Party could have had better weather for observing, it still had a lot of "surprises." Some of these surprises were seen through the eyepiece, while some just sneaked up from behind a parked car. I spotted this tom on my way out of the ranch on Friday morning.

Below are a few of the other surprises that I saw through the eyepiece last week. These were some of the best objects of the week.

The first one is The Splinter Galaxy, or NGC 5907. This is a 11th magnitude, edge on spiral galaxy in Draco. At 78x, the galaxy shows no real sign of a core, just a subtle brightening towards the center. I guess the attraction here is because of the thinness of the edge on galaxy. It really lives up to its name as the "Splinter" galaxy. Had I had more observing time or better seeing, I would have liked to come back to this object to see if  any of the dark lanes were visible.

The next object is M27, the Dumbbell Nebula. This is a very nice planetary nebula in Vulpecula. It is a 7.3 magnitude PN which displays quite well in the dark skies of West Texas. At 42x, it appears as a hazy patch, somewhat squarish in shape. At 100x, you see two brighter sides joined by a bright central bar. I suspect this is what gives it it's "Dumbbell" name. This is one of the finer objects of the week.









The last showpiece object was NGC 6826, otherwise known as the "Blinking Planetary." At 100x, this PN is bluish green in color. Direct vision makes the PN appear as a fuzzy star. When viewed with indirect or averted vision the PN suddenly swells in size, resulting in the so called "blinking." It was a truly amazing thing to observe as I switched from direct to averted vision and then back. The PN seemed to pop out and back in size. Moving the power up to  139x makes the blinking effect go away and the PN remains steadily swollen. Pretty cool!

Well, that's it for TSP'11. Two and a half nights of so-so observing, 34 objects logged, some new friends made, and a farewell wish from a turkey. Not a bad way to spend a week of vacation.

Clear skies;

rw

Texas Star Party '11 - Part 1

Last Sunday, I made what has started to become my annual pilgrimage to the West Texas Davis Mountains to attend the Texas Star Party. This is one of, if not the largest, star party in North America. The Davis Mountains offer extremely dark skies at an altitude of about 5,000 ft. A combination that draws amateur astronomers from all over the country, and some from across the globe.  I personally met people from Wisconsin, California, Washington DC, South Carolina as well as Ontario, Canada.  The fellowship, and presentations from other amateurs was truly amazing and  makes up a very large part of the whole experience.

The other part of the experience is of course the opportunity to observe under some of the darkest skies in the United States. Unfortunately this year, Mother Nature did not smile on the star gazers as well as in past years. Sunday and Monday nights were fair. Tuesday evening presented itself with a wind storm with 50+mph wind gusts. Wednesday evening had extremely poor seeing until the clouds showed up. Thursday teased us all day with perfectly blue skies only to end with clouds and smoke from a grass fire to the West.  With Friday not looking much better, I decided to pack up and start the 10 hour drive home.

Well, I do not want to dwell on the "what could have been," and instead, I would like to describe some of the true showpiece objects that I had the privilege to observe. All of the following observations were performed on my Zhumell 10 in Dob on May 30th between 10pm and 1am.

NGC 4826 - Black Eye Galaxy - Sirus Plossl 9mm, 139x Elongated with some brightening towards center. No defined core. Mottled appearance. Some dark lanes visible. Looks very much like a globular cluster.

M 81 - Bode's Galaxy - Smart Astronomy 12.5, 100x Slight brightening towards center, mottled appearance on the arms.  Core is non-stellar, halo visible.

M 82 - Cigar Galaxy - Smart Astronomy EF 16, 78x Edge on galaxy, slight brightening towards center, distinct core not visible.


M101 - Smart Astronomy 12.5, 100x Face on galaxy, core non-stellar. Individual stars visible in arms. Dark lanes between the arms. Arms appear to wrap clockwise from center.

M104 - Smart Astronomy 12.5, 100x Elongated, central bulge visible with stellar core. Averted vision reveals some mottling or dark lane down major axis of the galaxy. Sirius Plossl 9mm, 139x more mottling visible, core becomes non stellar, dark lane more visible.

M63 - Sirius Plossl 9mm, 139x Elongated in E-W direction, bright star on western edge. Central portion brighter, core is non stellar, some hint of arms.


M20 -  Smart Astronomy EF 16, 78x Star cluster with associate nebula. Nebula is to the east of the cluster.Nebula has central dark lane. Cluster is also dissected by dark line. Several faint stars shine though the nebula. Majority of the cluster stars are on the east side. Stars in cluster have similar brightness.
Cluster is detectable with the naked eye.

SN2011BY - Smart Astronomy 12.5, 100x Supper Nova is very faint. Host galaxy NGC 3972 is only visible with averted vision.  It is an edge on mag 13 object.


More next week.....

Clear skies
rw

Targets of Opportunity

  I spent last weekend at the Hodges Garden Star Party in Louisiana. This is an annual event sponsored by the Baton Rouge Astronomical Society. This was my first time attending the event, but by no means will it be my last. 

I arrived Thursday, and got set up. The observation field was a large pasture. There were about a dozen or so tents already set up.

Thursday night proved to be some truly awful seeing. I had brought a target list which had a lot of southern objects, but the southern sky seemed to be the worst for this location with a bit of a light dome. So, I turned to the list of H400 objects in Leo. In spite of the seeing, I was able to observe 14 galaxies in Leo and a total of 19 objects before turning in at about 1:30.

Friday evening proved to be another challenge, this time it was scattered cloud. I was able to finish off the H400 objects in Canis Major and I took the opportunity to gaze into the Virgo Galaxy Cluster. This was the first time my 10" scope had explored this region of the sky. I was not disappointed.  The light grasp of this light bucket is truly amazing. I worked on the Eastern side of the cluster, recording  M58, 59, 60, 89, and NGC 4564, 4567, 4568, 4596, 4608, and 4638. The clouds made their reappearance shortly after midnight and I called it a night with 15 objects scratched off my list.

Well Saturday night proved to be amazing conditions. The star party was opened to the public until about 10PM, and so the serious observing did not start until after the public had left. This time I attacked the Virgo Cluster from its dead center. M84 and M86 are located midway on a line between Denebola (Beta Leo) and
Vindemiatrix (epsilon Virgo).



As I looked through the 30mm wide field eyepiece, I saw six, yes six galaxies in the same field of view. M84 and M86 were the most prevalent, but in the also in the view was NGC4435, 4438, 4388 and 4461!
Here is the DSS photograph of M84, M86 and NGC 4438.  The trio form an equilateral triangle with M84 on the right, M86 on the left and NGC 4388 at the bottom. Cores and halos are visible on the Messier objects. M86 seems wider than M84 and suggests that its axis is tilted more towards us than M84's.
NGC 4388 was much fainter with even brightness across its length, no core was visible.

Located to the east of the trio are a pair of galaxies, NGC 4435 and 4438.  This pair is known as "The Eyes" and do look like a pair of eyes staring out of the darkness at you. Cores and halos are both visible.

The night ended with another 22 objects recorded. My H400 count now stands at 93. The performance of the 10" Zhumell was amazing and I am looking forward to the dark skies of Fort Davis at the Texas star Party next month.

Clear skies;

rw