Dave Mitsky
15-December-2007, 09:17 AM
Some fellow ASH members and I had planned on taking advantage of a temporary clearing on Wednesday evening to travel to a dark site but the conditions deteriorated a bit locally before we left and we decided that it wasn't worth chancing a hour and 20 minute drive. However, it may have been worth the trip since the cloud cover that rushed in unexpectedly dispersed and we had several hours of clear to partly cloudy skies and the observing site was most likely far enough north to be in the clear the whole time.
When I went outside to unpack my gear, the sky had cleared again so I had a peak at Comet 17P/Holmes through my Burgess Optical 15x70 binocular. A little later I went to a friend's house and we observed the comet through my Celestron Noble 8x42s and his Celestron Ultima 10x50s and Celestron Skymaster 15x70s. We could see the comet naked-eye with direct vision, even from a less than dark location with insufficient time for dark adaptation. The sky seemed to be growing more transparent so after I left I drove to the Naylor Observatory. Unfortunately, the forecast that I saw on the Internet before leaving my friend's house proved to be correct. Clouds moved in from the southwest and the sky was completely overcast by a little more than an hour after I arrived but I did get some observing in nevertheless.
I should have looked at Mars while I had the chance but I wanted to wait until it was a bit higher in the sky. At least I had a chance to see Comet 17P/Holmes again through the ASH Astroscan, StarBlast, 5" achromatic finder scope, and 17" classical Cassegrain. I could just barely make out the psuedonucleus through the 17" at 162 and 202x. It seemed like I could trace out the short tail that extends through the coma as well. Speaking of the coma, it was simply huge. It seemed to be far larger than the more luminous portion of M31 and was distinctly elongated.
A number of winter DSOs also met my gaze, IC 418 (the Raspberry or Spirograph Nebula) in Lepus for example. This rather odd planetary nebula looked pretty good at magnifications from 162 to 404x but I didn't catch any hint of its peculiar "raspberry" color this time around.
During the night, I saw two Geminids serendiptiously. I was planning on trying to do a count for an hour but the oncoming clouds put an end to that notion.
Dave Mitsky
When I went outside to unpack my gear, the sky had cleared again so I had a peak at Comet 17P/Holmes through my Burgess Optical 15x70 binocular. A little later I went to a friend's house and we observed the comet through my Celestron Noble 8x42s and his Celestron Ultima 10x50s and Celestron Skymaster 15x70s. We could see the comet naked-eye with direct vision, even from a less than dark location with insufficient time for dark adaptation. The sky seemed to be growing more transparent so after I left I drove to the Naylor Observatory. Unfortunately, the forecast that I saw on the Internet before leaving my friend's house proved to be correct. Clouds moved in from the southwest and the sky was completely overcast by a little more than an hour after I arrived but I did get some observing in nevertheless.
I should have looked at Mars while I had the chance but I wanted to wait until it was a bit higher in the sky. At least I had a chance to see Comet 17P/Holmes again through the ASH Astroscan, StarBlast, 5" achromatic finder scope, and 17" classical Cassegrain. I could just barely make out the psuedonucleus through the 17" at 162 and 202x. It seemed like I could trace out the short tail that extends through the coma as well. Speaking of the coma, it was simply huge. It seemed to be far larger than the more luminous portion of M31 and was distinctly elongated.
A number of winter DSOs also met my gaze, IC 418 (the Raspberry or Spirograph Nebula) in Lepus for example. This rather odd planetary nebula looked pretty good at magnifications from 162 to 404x but I didn't catch any hint of its peculiar "raspberry" color this time around.
During the night, I saw two Geminids serendiptiously. I was planning on trying to do a count for an hour but the oncoming clouds put an end to that notion.
Dave Mitsky