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Recent
Astronomical Observations
December
29, 2003- Columbus
Star gazing....Orion in color
A fellow
astronomer and I met together so that I could show him a new observing site I
happened upon for hte Geminids. We had a bright moon, but could still make out
the winter Milky Way. Orion was the first object we viewed. I had never seen
color in Orion and night was the first time!!! It was absolutely amazing!!! I
saw light tendrils of red reaching out from the center which held a green hue.
The moon was also targeted in the 8inch SkyQuest before it fogged up.
Temperature was 34 degrees when we left:)
December
13/14, 2003- Geminid
Meteor Shower
Geminid
Meteor Shower of 2003 pages
November
8, 2003- Lunar
Eclipse
I had known that
this eclipse was coming, but weather threatened my chances of seeing the show.
My fellow astronomer, Mark Egan, suggested chasing it. Hummm, sounds like
fun to me:) We traveled out 11 miles south of Beaumont watching the skies and
jumping out of the car every time the clouds parted over the moon. At one point
on 365 East Mark pulled out his scope and we viewed the eclipsing moon with his
8 inch scope. The chase was a success, as we were able to view several phases of
the moon including the total. The nice ruddy color was visible before the moon
was totally eclipsed. At the total phase, as expected, a very thin sliver of
white shown. We were not in the total path, but very close to it. The trip was
good practice for future chasing!
October
29, 2003- Aurora
in Texas
View my
observations here. WHOO HOO!!!!
July
26, 2003- Globular
Clusters and Star Hopping
My fellow
Astronomer, Mark Egan and I took an hour and a half drive from Houston to view
the stars. The night was a great success because it got both of us back into
observing. Mark brought his nice 8 inch scope and binoculars then began to show
me the wonders of the heavens above. Several faint sporadic meteors were
observed during the period. The following list is in order that we saw the
objects.
1) M7 2)
M3 3) M13+NGC6207 4) M22 5)
M101 6) The Veil Nebula (extremely faint, poss) NGC 6960,
6992, 6995 7) NGC 7789 8)
NGC 663+M103 9) Alberio (Beta Cygni) Double 10) Gamma
Andromeda (double) 11) Gamma Aries (double) 12) NGC457 13)
Mars 14)M92
The entire viewing session was glorious and I can't wait to
get back out there again, under those starry skies:)
July
22, 2003- Satellites
Galore
The next night we
took some more photographs and counted meteors and satellites from a location
West of San Antonio. There were six meteors observed and 13 satellites seen. At
one point there were four satellites in the sky at the same time. See my Shadow
page for photographs taken this night.
July
21, 2003- Shadows
from the Milky Way
See my Shadow
page that I setup for this event. This is one of my dreams come true and it
deserves a page all to itself:) Photographs included
July
?, 2003- Silver
Curtains... and Bootes Meteor Shower
A trip to visit
my Grandparents fell upon a perfect night of stars. This night the Bootes meteor
shower was to occur. Sometimes this shower can be quite nice, but this year the
common 1 to 2 meteors per hour were seen. On total I counted 5 Bootes meteors
and 7 sporadics. I viewed the stars from 9:30pm to 12am. The skies were glorious
as a cool front had just passed through leaving clear and dry skies. The sky was
quite deep and some objects stood out brilliantly in the sky. The Lagoon nebula
(6th mag) was an easy object as were
May
15, 2003- Blood
Moon- Total Lunar Eclipse
Our last lunar
eclipse was in 2000. I have eagerly been waiting for this one:) See my May
15th page on this event.
March
9, 2003- Glorious
and big Jupiter
I've been hearing
that Jupiter is at its best right now because we are closer to the planet now
than we have been in years. Knowing this I've been waiting for clear skies.
Finally, partly cloudy in Houston provides the opportunity to pull out the
scope. The best kind of astronomical viewing from the city is of the planets:)
Jupiter was big and beautiful with the moons clear beside it. The next door
neighbor's kids came out and I spent time in a brief astronomy lesson. The
children really enjoyed looking through the small scope and enjoyed the views of
Jupiter and the craters on the moon. Overall a very successful viewing, sparking
that interest in children:)
February
1, 2003- Shuttle
Loss
Special Page with
radar and shuttle re-entry maps. Dedicated to those who will never fade from our
memories, who gave their life in the exploration of science and space.
December
13/14, 2002- Geminid
Meteor Shower
Geminid Meteor
shower with my sister. See Geminid 2002
November
17/18, 2002- Leonid
Meteor Shower
Leonids with two
best friends, Carrie and Mark. See Leonid
2002 page
October
11/12, 2002- Area
wide Astronomy club meetings and Astronomy
Day
Start off the
weekend with an Area wide Astronomy meeting with two of my best friends:) On
Saturday Carrie and I go to Brazos Bend to join in on Astronomy Day. I heard so
many people who were talking afterwards about how much they enjoyed the event
and how they want to learn more about astronomy. What a wonderful way to spend
the evening. Only regret...one of my best friends had to work:(
September
14, 2002-
Sunspots
through heavy ozone!
The heavy ozone
for the Houston area the brightness of the sun was lessened enough
that I was able to view sunspot group 105! It was really a neat event!
August
15, 2002-
Bright satellite passes over Houston. Great view!
I knew that ISS would be crossing the Houston skies at 9:30pm on August 15th
because of Spaceweather.com and their up to date information. Thursday the 15th,
started off with a deluge of rain trapping co-workers at home. My heart sank
that morning as I saw the 80% chance of rain all day. I watched the skies while
at work and then once again at home.
At 9pm
I went out expecting nothing but clouds. I was delighted to see patches to the
skies...ahh, a chance! I went to the local field and gazed into the sky eagerly
waiting for the satellite and praying for a clear patch in that area of the
sky.
15
minutes later I saw the satellite:) The bright satellite was about twice
the size of Venus and just as bright as Venus at its best. I watched the
satellite cut across the sky like a slow meteor, in a little patch of clear sky
just big enough for the path. Yes! Just after seeing the satellite a very nice
meteor cut across about 5 degrees of the sky perpendicular to the path the
satellite had taken. Wow! The view was just what was needed to end the busy day.
Other
events on pages
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