Observation log
February 2004
Entries in reverse date order
23-Feb-04 21:00-23:40
Conditions: Clear, cold skies, but with increasing clouds towards midnight. Moderate
amount of skyglow to the East but decreasing as the evening progressed. Equipment: LX90 with 26mm eyepiece.
Observed Moon and Venus, Jupiter, M51, M13, M3,
and M81/M82.
Moon and Venus - tonight the crescent Moon to the West was very close to Venus in the sky,
so I took my camera out with telephoto lens and snapped a few handheld shots - one of the
better ones is below. I think you can see that Venus isn't perfectly circular - hopefully
that's due to its phase, but it could be due to camera shake! (although the Moon looks nice
and sharp so I don't think it is that). An impressive sight in the sky, Venus was very
bright indeed, and Earthshine illuminated the dark portion of the Moon (not really visible
in the photo though).
Jupiter - Again, very bright and rising high later. Three moons again visible initially;
after a quick check indoors on the PC I discovered that Callisto was currently transiting
across the face of the planet, and I'd probably just missed its shadow by a few minutes! I
checked again later (about 23:00) and indeed, a bright spot had appeared off one side of
the planet, just above its equator, on the same side as the other moons. Some hints of
structure could be seen around the dark bands, and the flattening of Jupiter at its poles
was apparent.
M51 - Similar to observations last night, bright cores and surrounding haze with
fleeting hints of structure.
M13 - Not as impressive as last night due to slightly more skyglow. However still a grand
site with some individual outlying stars being resolved.
M3 - A new globular cluster to me, this is even more impressive than M13 I thought, although
that's possibly due to the fact it was higher in the sky and thus suffered less from the
orange glow syndrome. I could resolve many outlying stars into fine filamentary structures
flowing out from the central bright core. I'm surprised at how large and obvious these
clusters are - this one filled about 1/4 of the field of view of the eyepiece.
M81 & M82 - Maybe my imagination but it felt like I was able to make out a larger hazed
area around M81, and a tighter core area. Dark bands could be seen running across the cigar
shape of M82.
Moon and Venus wide view
(Venus in top left corner)
Saturn - very high in the South, almost straight overhead in fact, it wasn't long before
it disappeared behind the house. Nice sharp definition to the rings, with 3 moons visible.
Some pale banding on the planet and hints of division in the rings.
Jupiter - very bright and rising high by midnight. First viewing was at 20:40, whilst it
was quite low still and thus wobbling in the air. Three moons were visible - Europa, Ganymede
and Callisto. Io was occulted by Jupiter. Very evident banding on the planet, with hints of
structure to the belts, but I need more power to make them out any better. Observing again
later (22:00), Io was just appearing to one side, so I watched the dark gap between moon and
planet widen over the space of 30mins or so. It was most interesting to watch orbital mechanics
"live" like this!
M13 Hercules Globular Cluster - My first globular cluster! Very low above my horizon so
caught up in lots of skyglow (the ringroad is that way) but visible as a bright hazy
circular splodge fading out from a central concentration. After a few minutes observing
and with averted vision some of the surrounding stars could be resolved.
M51 Whirlpool Galaxy - Looked at this hoping for my first glimpse of galactic spiral
structure. Evident immediately were the two central bright bulges, and after a few minutes
a surrounding haze of light became apparent. However there were only fleeting moments
where I could half-convince myself there was any structure to this haze. I need darker
skies!
M97 Owl Nebula - this wasn't hugely impressive, due probably to my not-so-dark skies.
I could detect a pale white haze but nothing more, even after looking at it for a short
while.
M81 & M82 - these are turning into a couple of favourites as they're so reliable. Nice
and bright so they shine through a poor sky, and with enough hints of structure to make
them worth looking at for a while.
Mizar - another peek at this double, just because "it's there" really! I find it a
reasonable test of the steadiness of the sky to see whether I can get a nice sharp
focus and crisp break between the components.
20-Feb-04 21:00-21:25
Conditions: Lots of thick low orangey (glow) cloud but cold, crisp & clear in the
occasional break. Increasingly windy. Gave up after only 25mins as the clouds got 100%! Equipment: LX90 with 26mm eyepiece.
Observed Jupiter and Mizar.
Jupiter - difficult to make out details due to hazy clouds scudding in the way and the shake
induced by wind gusts. All four bright moons were lined up to one side of the planet.
Mizar - Just a quick peek because it was one of the very few stars visible between the
cloud breaks. Nice clear split of the double.
8-Feb-04 19:00-19:30, 21:45-23:00
Conditions: Earlier on patchy cloud & high haze, very clear later but some pale orangey
light-pollution haze. Equipment: LX90 with 26mm eyepiece.
Observed M81, M82, Jupiter, Mizar, the Moon
and Saturn (19:30)
M81 - spiral galaxy North of the tip of Ursa Major. Largish & fairly bright oval grey haze
with fairly tight brighter central core. No other structure visible - probably too much
light pollution. Sketched the field of view with surrounding stars as a reference to compare
against in RedShift later.
M82 - irregular galaxy, part of the M81 group. Stubby "cigar" shape with slightly brighter
streak along centre. Hint of dark "lanes" across the middle of the cigar perpendicular
to the galactic plane. Quite a nice view; sketched surrounding field for later reference.
Jupiter - rising above the hedge to the South-East around 22:00, still low in the sky
so it was rather fuzzy and hard to focus well. Two prominent dark bands across the planet,
with hints of structure during the (very) occasional stable view. All four moons obvious,
with two appearing very close to each other (see sketch but note I only drew the central
area of the eyepiece fov so it's not "to scale"!).
Saturn - I looked at this earlier in the evening during a brief 30min break in the
clouds, high up to the South. There was a fair bit of high haze so the view was a bit
fuzzy but 3 moons were visible, plus a faint band across the planet and of course the
rings (but no division).
Mizar - double star system in Ursa Major. Alcor (its visual companion) is 80% of a field
of view away (with 26mm eyepiece), and is visible naked-eye. However Mizar has a closer
true double, easily split tonight although a higher-power eyepiece would make it more
obvious. This is probably the first time I've really appreciated a double!
The Moon - this was the first occasion I'd spent much time looking at the moon through
the LX90, and boy was it impressive. Only a few days past full, the terminator was just
starting to really highlight some of the craters - with amazing shadows cast by crater
walls across the basins and great details of central crater peaks being obvious. Can't
wait for those higher-power eyepieces! (a recurring theme...) I think I need to learn
my way around the lunar surface as it's slightly frustrating not being able to put names
to the features I'm looking at. I also didn't feel brave enough to attempt a sketch this
time - there was just too much detail for a quick job - need to spend longer with just
this aim in mind to avoid distractions.
M81, M82, Jupiter
Moon and Jupiter wide view
(Jupiter in top right corner)
