I photographed Comet Lovejoy at 4.30am on Christmas morning from Riverview. I was looking east towards the city so there was a lot of sky glow. However being Christmas morning, the city sky was darker than normal. The comet was just barely visible to the unaided eye, but in binoculars it was easily visible with a tail of about 15 degrees (three binocular fields) in length.
Image details: Nikon D700, 15 sec, f10, ISO3200, 60mm lens
Peter Nosworthy
Next Tuesday the 15th is the NSAS November GM. If you haven’t been making it to the GMs, maybe you want to make an exception for this one, as David Malin, the man who invented modern three-colour astrophotography while a scientist-photographer at the AAO, is our guest speaker. Those of you who have heard him speak before know that he is a very entertaining and knowledgeable speaker, and will have points of interest for anyone who is an amateur astronomer. David will be speaking to NSAS on the history of astrophotography, and I recommend everyone in the Society who can get to Regis Hall next Tuesday to make it for this exceptional event. As usual, visitors are welcome, and the GM starts at 7:30 PM. See the home page of our website for directions if you haven’t been before.
For those interested, the very nice video of the Parkes field trip is now on the Media page of the website. Depending on your browser, it will launch there or in a YouTube page.
The NSAS New Astronomers Group will meet Tuesday the 28th at 7:30 at Regis Hall, St. Ignatius College. The subject this month is “Finding your way in the sky”. As usual, visitors are welcome.
NSAS will have the June GM this Tuesday night, at 7:30 PM, and in our new venue, Regis Hall (see the website for directions if you didn’t get them previously by email). If it’s a cold night, dress warmly, as there is no heating. The speaker this month is Dr Jonathon Horner, a post-Doc at Uni of NSW. His presentation is “Jupiter: Friend or Foe”, and his abstract follows:
“It has long been believed that the planet Jupiter has played an important role in the development of life on Earth. Without the particular size and placement of Jupiter, it is argued, the Earth would have experienced a greatly enhanced flux of impacts from asteroids and comets, hindering or entirely preventing the development of life. Despite the vigour with which this belief is held, very little work has been performed to examine the effect of Jupiter on the terrestrial planet impact flux. We have now completed the first detailed study of the effect of Jupiter’s mass on the impact rate of the three types of potentially hazardous objects – the Near Earth Asteroids, the Short Period Comets, and the Long Period Comets, and have found that the situation is, at the very least, significantly more complicated than was previously thought…”
All members and visitors are welcome.
Alex Fillippenko has had to pull out at the last moment, and the Sunday talk at the Powerhouse will now be by Prof. Robert Kirshner (Harvard Uni), who also works on Dark Energy. The time is the same, and Fred Watson will introduce the speaker.
NSAS supported the opening of the Space Gallery at Seaforth Public School Thursday night the 9th with a table and our pop-ups. The teachers and children (Primary) had done a wonderful job of putting together some very professional resources into a Space-themed hallway display, including some collections from serious collectors in this area. The evening was attended by (it seemed) thousands (see pics), who crowded into the auditorium for various stands selling books, Oz Geographic, cakes, and, us. David Malin opened the Space Gallery, and then drew the raffle tickets! He seems as ubiquitous as NSAS at the moment. Anyway, we got some “hits” from interested families, so it was all worthwhile, and we’ve offered to support any future Star Parties.
The May General meeting will take place tomorrow night, Tuesday the 17th, at 7:30 in the Fr. Mac (Sports) Pavilion, as usual. Our guest speaker is Jason Spyromilio, from the European Southern Observatory, ESO. He will talk to us about the E-ELT (Etremely Large Telescope), which should be very interesting.
Abstract
The E-ELT is the largest of the planned future optical/NIR ground based telescopes with a 42-m diameter primary mirror. The project has just concluded the detailed design phase (phase B). The presentation shall delve into the science drivers for the project and detail the current technical status, describe the level of industrial readiness in anticipation of a start of construction later this year.
We also have some exciting news about our future meeting facilities at St. Ignatius.
We kick off 2011 with our first General Meeting next Tuesday the 15th. As usual, the meeting starts at 7:30 at the Sports Pavilion, St. Ignatius College. At 8:00, our speaker for the month, Stefan Oslowski from Swinburne Uni, will make a presentation on pulsars. His abstract follows:
Abstract:
Pulsars are fascinating objects. They are quickly spinning, dense,
magnetised stars that are considered to be the Universe’s best
celestial clocks. Some of them are as good as the atomic clocks! But
are they really? I will describe how we observe pulsars with the radio
telescope in Parkes, NSW, and what hope to achieve by doing that. Our
goals can only be met if these celestial clocks really are as good as
we think they are. But are they really as good?
Members and visitors are welcome.
For those of you who have missed the emails, the NSAS Christmas Party will be next Tuesday the 21st at 7:00 PM, at St Ignatius. Due to the partial Lunar eclipse scheduled for the evening (eclipsed as it rises around 8:00 PM), we have changed the program to a Sausage Sizzle, so everyone is not stuck inside with the Christmas Cakes! If you haven’t advised anyone that you are coming, we’d appreciate a message on the Society email so we can get the numbers right. Bring your partners along, as well; no one turned away. There will be drinks (alcoholic/non-alcoholic) and desert. Come along and say hello to your colleagues.
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Sydney Star Gazers
This is a site setup by one of our members consisting of weather forecasts for Sydney which are great for planning observing nights.The site also is divided into other areas which are Universe Watch, Asteroid Watch, and Comet Watch which are updated frequently. |
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