Newsletter of RAS (Richmond Astronomical Society)
November, 2002

Visit our web site at www.richastro.org

Next meeting--Monday, Nov. 11

Change in meeting location
from Ken Wilson

Due to the last minute addition of the Star Wars IMAX movie to our museum schedule on Monday nights we're going to have to move the RAS meetings for November and December from the planetarium to the Eureka Theater (a space on the 3rd floor where we've met before). 

Last meeting
by Gary Cowardin

• Jim Petty brought in an article about UVA -- they will invest $4,000,000 in an Arizona observatory, and a team headed by Dr. Robert T Rood will be spending approximately $2,000,000/year for 7 nights/year, or $28,571/night over 10 years or $5,714/night over 50 years!
• Ken Wilson brought in star charts and ISS reports for the month.
• Jim Blowers had an article about the discovery of another large object, just smaller than Pluto. 
  

Reports:

• SMV Skywatch - Jim Blowers said a few people saw Venus early on, 
  Ken said we had about 300!
• Powhatan - Ken and Betty Wilson were out during the last quarter moon and saw the ISS with their telescope. A good way to find out in advance if anyone is going to go out, is to visit our list server: 
  www.richastro.org -> "Join our Yahoo Group listserver" 
• John Barnett visited a great new site at the James River State Park, 40 miles from Lynchburg, 40 miles from Charlottesville, and 50 miles from Richmond. The park was built in 1999.
• Keith Johnson is coordinating quarterly skywatches at the new James River 
  Park. The park rangers are very interested in a regular skywatch program. 
  12/7/02 will be the next skywatch at this location. 

Observatory:

• Cleaned out some of the old junk and sold much at VAAS. New training classes will be starting soon. 

Skywatches:

• Jim Petty reported that we will not do any more skywatches at Dutch Gap - not enough participation. All new skywatches for this location will take place at the soccer field on Fridays. The schedule is set.
• SMV - Ken Wilson told us about an annual convention for Virginia science teachers. It will include an open house on Thursday night, 11/7/02, with a star party from 6-9 pm. Please sign up with Ken and bring your scope. 

Visitors:

• Introduced by Grace Suttle:  
  Fabio Grnonie - sponsored by Grace Suttle, James Dow - sponsored by John Raymond, and Rob Kent - sponsored by Len Cobb. 
  

Board Meeting - We had a short board meeting during the break and decided to sell the 13" Dob currently sitting in John's living room for $400 or more. (scope that was at the farm - needs some work). John is going to try to sell it at a star party coming up at the end of the month. 

Len Cobb gave a Short Talk, based on an article from Scientific American, on relativity.

Charlotte Talley gave the main presentation, a video, titled "Death Star."

2003 Board nominees
from The Nominating Committee

A nominating committee, made up of Cindy Bowers (chairman), Chris McCann, Jim Petty, Grace Suttle, Norm Guenther, have been making some phone calls to twist some arms--oops, entice some people to join our board for 2003. They have come up with a full slate, so when that phone rings at 2:00 am.. you're now safe! Here are the nominees for next year's board:

• Terry Barker

• Jim Blowers 

• Cindy Bowers 

• Gary Cowardin 

• Joe Hetmanski 

• Jim Petty 

• John Raymond 

• Eric Shelton 

• Charlotte Talley 

• Dave Thomas 

• Chris McCann 

• Norm Guenther 

Coming events
by Terry Barker

We have several skywatches and star parties coming up.

• 11/1-2 -- Malvern Hill

• 11/1 -- Mid-Atlantic Star Party, http://www.masp.org/home.htm 

• 11/1 -- East Coast Star Party, http://groups.hamptonroads.com/pages1.cfm?page_id=7474

• 11/7 -- Teachers Conference Skywatch, SMV

• 11/8 -- Sayler's Creek, 6:30 pm

• 11/15 -- SMV skywatch

• 11/17 -- We may try to set up a night around 11/17/02 for the Leonid Meteors (John Raymond).

Times-Dispatch article
by Lindsay Kastner, Oct. 16, Richmond Times-Dispatch

http://www.timesdispatch.com/news/MGBKT4L1B7D.html

Jim Blowers stays out late. All night on occasion. He likes to watch as stars are born.

The stage before him is a velvet-black sky, where he gazes up on the Orion Nebula, a relatively nearby stellar nursery where stars - real ones - emerge from dust and gas.

Blowers is president of the Richmond Astronomical Society, whose members have met each month for more than 50 years. The club brings together about 70 astronomy buffs from Richmond and the surrounding localities.

For many members, their fascination with stars, planets and other cosmic objects began in their youth. But while other childhood hobbies fell by the wayside, astronomy simply failed to fade away.

Depending on age, amateur astronomers often point to "Star Wars," "Star Trek" or NASA's once-fledgling space program as the spark that launched their interest in outer space.

Ken Wilson, Hanover County resident, has been fascinated by astronomy since he was 8 or 9 years old.

"I grew up during the beginning days of the space program," Wilson said. It was a time when nearly every child took an interest in space, but Wilson said one event in particular got him hooked.

At the Michigan State Fair, he peered through a telescope and spotted Saturn, in all its ringed glory. "That experience has stuck with me ever since."

Wilson, an RAS member and the Science Museum of Virginia's director of astronomy, now teaches others about stargazing. It's the perfect egalitarian pursuit.

"Everyone has a sky above them," Wilson said.

Amateur astronomer John Raymond agreed.

"If you've ever seen the night sky in a really dark place . . . there's just something about it," he said. "It's beautiful. It's mysterious. It's like a work of art, but it belongs to everybody."

Avid stargazers might spend lots of money on equipment and drive hundreds of miles to prime viewing locations, but for beginners, enjoying the night sky can be as easy as looking up.

"Even if you just go in your back yard and look, you can see a lot of things," said Raymond, who frequently goes gazing in his own back yard in Chesterfield County.

Fall is a particularly good time to check out the stars.

ERIN FREDRICHS/TIMES-DISPATCH

Randolph-Macon College senior Lisa Gray focuses the telescope during a viewing at Keeble Observatory on campus.

"It gets cold enough that there's not a lot of water vapor in the air," explained George Spagna, chairman of the physics department at Randolph-Macon College in Ashland. "When it gets clear, it gets really clear."

Spagna said novice viewing is best done with the naked eye.

"I don't recommend starting with a telescope anyway," said Spagna, who also serves as director of the college's Keeble Observatory.

KEN WILSON

"As you go from a naked eye to binoculars to a telescope your field of view gets smaller," he explained.

Looking through a telescope before becoming familiar with the night sky is a good way to get frustrated quickly, he said, because everything is viewed out of context.

Wilson put it this way: "If you have a telescope, you have to know what to point it at."

So how does one get to know the sky?

Star charts can help, but Wilson said it's best to have someone offering guidance when beginning astronomical pursuits.

He said the Science Museum's LiveSky planetarium show provides a good introduction to the sky. Shown at 6 p.m. on the third Friday of each month, LiveSky is followed by an outdoor Sky Watch - a joint venture between the museum and the astronomical society - which Wilson called "the oldest continually run public program at the Science Museum."

Attendance varies, he said, "depending on weather, publicity. . . . It ranges from two to 500. Typically, we'll have about 150 spread over the evening."

Free and open to the public, the Sky Watch lets beginning stargazers benefit from the expertise of RAS volunteers. In addition, it gives them an opportunity to look through a telescope without having to spend a lot of money for equipment they aren't ready to own.

But in general, stargazing is better done away from city lights. Light pollution can make bright stars appear dim and faint stars disappear altogether.

KEN WILSON

Even a full moon can hamper a person's ability to see the stars. While astronomers know that electricity will never be squelched in favor of starlight, they point out that much light pollution comes from poorly directed lights. Continuing development of subdivisions and shopping centers means that more and more stargazers are forced to grapple with light in places that were once havens of darkness.

"If you just take the United States - we waste about $2 billion of electricity every year with light that goes up instead of down," Wilson said. Experts say sites such as the Science Museum and Keeble Observatory already sit amid polluted skies.

Even at the Science Museum, in the heart of Richmond, stargazers can see decent views of planets and brighter stars. But to many amateur astronomers, it's worth seeking out a truly dark sky.

"There are two things that I go to when I need to have my battery recharged," said RAS member David E. Credicott, a Chesterfield resident. One is the ocean, where Credicott said he enjoys a feeling of timelessness.

"That's far eclipsed - excuse my pun - by the experience of looking into the sky and seeing the stars because you're literally looking out into time," he said, explaining that the stars and planets are millions of light years from Earth.

"It's like looking out into infinity."

Examining the universe helps him put life's challenges in perspective, Wilson said.

"You begin to realize how small the problems we encounter day to day really are."

Possible ATM group?
by John Raymond

I sent the following e-mail out in September to a few people, I wanted to
wait for the November meeting to announce this, but here goes:

I will also send an email to richasto news group. I want to propose a
monthly ATM (amateur telescope making) meeting once a month. The purpose
is for those interested in telescopes to discuss telescope topics including:
homemade and commercially made scopes,
buying, making, fixing, mirror/lens grinding, mounts, tripods, drives,
restoration, collimation, eyepieces, accessories, star charts, etc.
This will give people a chance to see scopes in the daytime and our
esteemed panel of experts will solve your telescope problems and concerns.

I propose to have this meeting on Saturday or Sunday afternoons, about 3
hours in length, on full moon weekends. We can have this at the
observatory, but I would like to have it at someone's house, even my
unfortunate hovel will do. 

Also we can alternate dates and times to accommodate people with
fixed schedules.

You can contact John at 323-8822 or raymondj@prodigy.net.

Dark sky observing site at James River State Park
by John Barnett

The sky was very clear and certainly dark at the James River State Park ( JRSP ) last Saturday night, Oct.5. As prearranged, the ranger had secured a site very accessible for our vehicles and scopes, and had alerted about 5 families camping in the park elsewhere to join us for scoping at dark. The 3 of us RAS folks were not charged any park fees, which are nominally $2 for each car and $13 per campsite (Va's budget crunch has forced a lot of user fees on the parks now). I drove there directly from the VAAS meeting at Ashland in 2 hours, 20 minutes.
          
Keith Johnson (who is a high school football coach when not scoping!) corralled the 20 or so guests at a nearby shelter and gave a fine 20 minute twilight talk on the scopes and celestial objects for the evening. We had purposefully traveled with light scopes since this was our first scoping adventure at JRSP, just in case the roads were rough and the site uneven - but the access roads and site were just fine. The largest scope we used was my little 6" Russian Maksutov. Keith and Kenneth brought two 90 mm short tube refractors. Sure, "aperture rules" they say, but really dark sky trumps all.

We got fine bright images of binaries and M31, M2, M15, M11, and much more. Too bad we did not have a big 13" dob with us - we would have needed sunglasses! It is normally a tough sell without planets or the moon to non-observers, but they really enjoyed their views for a couple hours, as did we.

The ranger accommodated us wonderfully, even pulling the plug on a nearby coke machine to give complete darkness. I estimate the transparency was a solid 6 magnitude and the seeing about 7+. It surpassed the Powhatan site easily. Keith figures it to be equivalent to the Saylor's Creek Park near Farmville.

The park is a huge, remote area on the east bank of the river about 7 miles downstream of the Rt. 60 bridge over the James ("Bent Creek" on the road map). It has been open for only 2 or 3 years. Except for unusual events like the Batteau festivals in June, I don't get the idea that it is used by hordes of people often, at least not yet. I first noticed the dark skies there when I crewed on the batteau "Fluvanna" in June, 2001 and 2002 when we encamped there on the river bank for the nights during our voyages from Lynchburg to Richmond.
  
The park's website: http://www.dcr.state.va.us/parks/jamesriv.htm

VAAS observing
by John Raymond

VAAS was a very satisfying experience.

The morning presentations were very informative.

I want to thank David Thomas for the coffee, doughnuts, and orange juice in
the morning and the wonderful hamburgers at the picnic. What kind of burgers were they? Those were the best burgers I've ever had.

Former RAS member Gene Dick drove all the way from Raleigh, NC to attend.

The best part of the day for me was the observing session after the picnic.
The observing site wasn't very dark, and the strobe light over the radio
tower interfered with Cassiopeia and Perseus.  The field was bordered by
trees in a line from the southeast to the northwest. The southern horizon
was dominated by the Richmond light dome. Fomalhaut was rising in the
southeast and the top of Bootes and Corona Borealis were above the
northwest.

All of the following were found by star hopping:

I started my observing with Enif (eta pegasi) a lovely orange star that
marks the nose of Pegasus.
Then: M15 in Pegasus
M57
Albireo
Mizar
M57
M11
Omicron-1 Cygni (triple)
M31, 32, 110 group
Gamma Andromeda
Eta Persei
I was unable to find NGC 7048, a 12th mag planetary in Cygnus, due to light
pollution.
NGC 7026- small and faint in my scope, big and bright in Eric Shelton's
scope. Planetary in Cygnus
63 Cygni- very yellow star
16 Cygni
Ngc 6826, another planetary in Cygnus, in the same low power field as 16
cygni
Mu Cephei, the Garnet Star
Beta, Xi, and Delta Cephei
NGC 7160
8 Lacertae (Thanks Eric)
Alpha Cassiopeiae
Eta Cass (I see the fainter star as purple)
Iota Cass (triple)
Ngc 457
Ngc 663
M45
There were many other objects, I only remember these.

Observers:
Susan Brubaker: 8" dob, 11x80 binocs
Ray Moody : 14" Stellafane dob (same one used 5 years ago), 11x80 binocs
Gordon Morrisette: 7x50(?) binocs
John Raymond: 7" meade
Gene Dick: Green Laser Pointer
Dave Credicott: 4.5"  new Meade Goto reflector
Mark Licata: 7x50(?) binocs
Eric Shelton: 18" Truss Dob
Jim Blowers: 4" Meade 2045 SCT
Gary Cowardin: 7x50(?) binocs and a night vision scope. I observed the
Pleiades with the night vision scope.

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