Newsletter of RAS (Richmond Astronomical Society)
October, 2003

Visit our web site at www.richastro.org

Next meeting--Monday, Oct. 13

Last meeting
by Terry Barker

• Ken Wilson provided copies of star maps and Iridium flare timings. Ken also had some nice pictures of Mars that he took last Fri. night
• Gary Cowardin brought in a DVD series on the universe that the club has purchased. He is showing one of the DVD's for his presentation tonight. This will give the club a chance to preview our purchase.
• Chris McCann passed out a flyer he makes up each month, highlighting viewing events for the coming month.
• Cindy Bowers had Astronomy calendars for purchase, at the low, low price of $6.00.
• Terry Barker had signup sheets for food for the Oct. 4 picnic. And he also had a signup sheet for people to be put onto an email list for Mars observing at the observatory.

Reports and observing:

• Gary Cowardin had brief glimpses of Mars at the last SMV skywatch, but was basically clouded out. We had an amazing number of people show up for the Mars skywatch, even though is was clouded out--two to three THOUSAND people showed. This was a great opportunity for us to hand out the hundred RAS flyers we had made up.
• Chris McCann is heading up the nominating committee for next year's officers and board. Also on the committee are Charlotte Talley, Terry Barker, Jim Langley, Roger Rigby, and David Credicott. If you're interested in a position, let one of these people know, please. The main duties of the board members are:
  • Board meetings 4 times a year
  • Planning events like the annual picnic and VAAS
  • Be responsible for one presentation during the year
  • Budget planning
• Charlotte Talley greeted four visitors--Thomas Kennedy, William Jeffries, and Scott  and Bill Robinson.
• Sue Brubaker gave a nice Power Point presentation on the library, including the contents (some are extremely old and somewhat valuable), where the books are stored, how to check out books, and where to return them.

Observatory:

• John Barnette got in three good nights of observing Mars at the observatory, and held several training sessions.

Skywatches and other events:

• Oct. 4, RAS picnic on Sat., Oct. 4 at Walton Lake. We're replacing the annual observatory picnic with a bigger occasion that we think will get more people and their families involved. We'll also do star gazing there. Note that this is a change from where we had originally planned the picnic, at Crump Park.
• Oct. 2, Lakewood Manor. See John Barnette for details.
• The SMV skywatch will be Friday, Oct. 17.
• Oct. 22-26, Peach State Star Gaze, http://personal.atl.bellsouth.net/p/o/poshedly/pssg/index.html
• Nov. 15, VAAS, held by the Norfolk Astronomical Society. A web site of http://groups.hamptonroads.com/VAAS/ has been established with an email contact of VAASCon@hamptonroads.com.

John Raymond gave the "short talk", on the 10 best double stars of the fall skies. His list:

Gary Cowardin gave the main presentation, showing one of the new DVD's the club just bought. This topic was titled "The Astronomers' Tool Kit." It gave an overview of how CCD cameras work and included some of the other devices that astronomers use to study stars. The DVD was well received by the members, and we decided we had made a good purchase. Unfortunately, we stiill have to return some of the DVD's, as five of the 10 we received were unplayable.

RAS picnic
by Terry Barker

We have a last minute change to the picnic--it will be held at Walton Lake, on the south side, instead of Crump Park. For some reason the Park decided after the fact that we could not stay past 9:00 pm. Since part of the reason we were having the picnic was for observing, this was unacceptable. Fortunately, Roger Rigby was able to get us into his neighborhood clubhouse with extremely short notice, and got the usual fee waived--way to go, Roger! Here's a map and directions:

Take the Powhite south, take the Courthouse exit (after Midlothian). Take a right onto Courthouse, and then a left at the light at Lucks Lane. You’ll come to a 4 way stop after a couple of miles. Take a right onto Walton Lake Pkwy. Walton Lake Drive is the first right after you cross the bridge on the lake in the center of this map. Start time is 4 pm, and we will be staying after dark for the skywatch. You can check up on the food situation by contacting Dave Credicott with any food updates, or see the food webpage:

http://www.pipeline.com/~aviatrix/RASPicnic.htm

Observing in west Hanover
by Jerry Zaun

I am not up to Johns doubles yet but last night was a repeat of Tue
a week ago. Not having anyone to go out with I decided late  to go
to my private club in western Hanover. I can lock the gate and not
worry about unwanted visitors. Decided to take my 8" dob because I
did not plan to stay long. I was able to add 5 M objects to my list.
Spent a lot of time trying to find M72,, very dim globular cluster,
and quite a bit opf time  on M73, a very open cluster. Picked up M30
a very nice (Like a Small M13) globular cluster. Spent a hour
looking for M39. Just too many stars. Finally found it with a 35mm
2" lens. Visited some old friends, M13, Andrometer, MARS and laid
back on the bench with binoculars and admired the milky way. Finally
ended up the night around 12:30 with M45, Pleiades. That was a great
ending to a great night.

Wish you all were there!

Jansky lecture
by Ken Wilson

Powhatan report
by Jerry Zaun

John Raymond called me yesterday afternoon and wanted to go to
Powhatan. I almost didn't go. Boy am I glad I did. It was a great
night. The milky way went from horizon to horizon. The seeing was
very good in my opion but being new, I will let John rate it. We
were there from 8:00 to 11:00 and I found 7 new ( to me ) Messier
objects,  M31 Andrometer Galaxy,  M110 Satalite of M31,   M32
Satalite of M31,  M76 The little dumbell nebular,  M15,  M34,  and
M33 Triangulum Galaxy ( I must admit I had John help me find this
one, It was very very dim. Spent some time just gazing with the
binoculars and finally ended the night viewing Mars. The Ice cap
seems very small now, at least in my eyes,  but we did get some
horizontal surface lines with the red filter. All I can say about
last night is WOW!

Wish you all had been there!

Aug. 15 skywatch at SMV
by Jim Blowers and John Raymond

I found it to be one of the best skywatches I have attended. What made
it so for me was being able to get objects into the telescope that I
could not possibly see with the naked eye - due to the go-to feature of
my telescope. The highlight of the evening was Gary Cowardin showing
both Mars and the Moon on a large screen with his CCD equipment
connected to another astronomer's 12-inch telescope. The features were
easily noticeable and I got a charge out of looking up at the sky at the
red point of light and looking below and seeing the magnified image of
that object on the screen. We could have danced a lot about it, but the
setup was so sensitive that dancing, stomping, or even a bus passing by
on Broad Street would give the image the jitters. The lights came back
on at 11 pm, but that did not seem to matter on a hazy light-polluted
night.

Jim Blowers

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