October 2015 issue of The Southern Astronomer

The Southern Astronomer No.85 – October 2015

SOUTHERN ASTRONOMER THE

MONTHLY MAGAZINE OF WORTHING ASTRONOMERS & WORTHING SKYWATCHERS

HARVEST PERIGEE MOON ECLIPSE SEPTEMBER 28, 2015

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The Southern Astronomer No.85 – October 2015

Astronomy Meetings The groups listed below begin their meetings at 19.30hrs BST Worthing Astronomers (WA) meet on the first Friday of the month, every two months (February, April, June, August, October and December) at Goring Methodist Church Hall, Bury Drive (off of Aldsworth Avenue) Worthing, BN12 4XB. Admission £3.

Adur AS (AAS) meet at Southwick Christian Community Church, 1-5 Roman Crescent, Southwick BN42 4TY, first Monday of the month. Admission: £5 for guests, £3 for members.

WA and AAS venues have off road parking facilities and grounds adjacent for setting up telescopes when conditions allow.

More monthly details in the Quick View Diary (right).

Worthing Astronomers is a free to join society with a membership of about 400 persons, all united with an interest in Astronomy and its associated subjects.

With the aid of this newsletter, website, social media, regular star parties, workshops and public observing events we hope to encourage and share our interests in observing the sky with the public, our colleagues in our own group and with neighbouring societies.

This Issue Diary, listings, September Observing reports: InOMN nights Perigee Moon Observing October Workshop Preview Observing Notes for October AGM 2014 and Treasurer report for 2015 Income over Expenditure 2015

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QUICK VIEW ASTRO EVENTS DIARY October All times shown are Universal Time (UT = GMT = BST minus 1 hour) For WA and AAS details, see side bar on left

1 2 4 5 11 12 13 20 25 26 27 31

Sunrise 0602h : Sunset 1745h WA: Workshop – Making Every Photon Count – Astro-Imaging by Steve Richards Moon: Last Quarter (21h) AAS: Supernovae by Dr Robert Smith Moon at apogee (furthest point to Earth in its monthly orbit) (13h) Uranus at opposition (03h) New Moon (0h) Orionid Meteor shower maximum Moon: First Quarter (20h) Clocks go back 1 hour – GMT/UT begins (01h) Venus at greatest western elongation, 46° close conjunction with Jupiter (08h) Moon at perigee (nearest point to Earth in its monthly orbit) (13h) Full Moon (12h) Sunrise 0651h : Sunset 1643h

CONTRIBUTIONS AND UNSUBSCRIBE Contributions – written articles (preferably word processed in .txt, .doc or .odt format), photographs or letters to the editor for the November issue should be in by October 15 and sent to the editor at the contact address: editor@worthingastronomers.org.uk If you no longer wish to subscribe to the group and cancel newsletters and other information, please send an email to: info@worthingastronomers.org.uk with 'Unsubscribe' in the subject line; we do not want our stuff to end up like spam littering your in-box.

Volunteers are always welcome: if you want to find out more, call 01903 521205 or drop us a line at the e-mail address above.

Lunar phases, October 2015

If you like the newsletter or its content please feel free to distribute it to anyone you know who might be interested.

Content is subject to copyright to the group and/or the individuals whose images or articles are used.

Cover Page: Just one of many pictures of the lunar eclipse.

Steve Bassett turned in an impressive montage of the highlights of the night.

Visibility of the planets mid-October

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page 2 page 3 page 4 page 5 pages 6-8 page 9 page 10

The Southern Astronomer No.85 – October 2015

SEPTEMBER OBSERVING InOMN Observing

There were six manned moon landings in all, two on the western lunar hemisphere and four on the eastern.

The famous Clerk of the Weather [not Matt Taylor then? Ed] smiled on us on the nights of September 19 and 20 as we met on Worthing seafront to cover our part of the International Observe The Moon Night.

The US space agency played safe with the first lunar landing by bringing it down in an interesting area on the relatively 'flat'(!) lunar mare of Tranquilitatis.

A collection of thirty or so telescopes plus many cameras with telephoto lenses were assembled to observe the Moon and show the members of the public, views of our nearest neighbour in space.

For many members, this was to be a trial run for the total eclipse the following weekend so note taking regarding camera settings were in abundance.

By the end of the moon programme, astronauts had trodden the lunar highlands like Apollo's 16 and 17, pulled carts across its surface and driven across it on electric cars.

The Moon was not even first quarter, so the lunar terminator (shadow line) cut across many interesting features and this mix of light and shadow enhanced the lunar features which people were able to see.

As usual there was a mix of instruments present. The largest refractor was 152mm f8 Bresser of Derek Wilkins. Perry Wilkins had connected a planetary camera to the eyepiece end which fed a live feed of lunar images onto a laptop PC which allowed several people to look at the Moon at the same time.

© Andy Spencer

© Sophie Garbo

Sophie's picture (above) from the 19th captures the Moon in its glory as it hung over a calm seascape. The southern highlands were visible as were some of the interesting dark plains – the so-called lunar seas. The regions of three Apollo lunar landing sites were on display; Apollo 11(dark plain close to centre); Apollo 16 in the brighter southern highlands and, Apollo 17 (the rim of the almost circular uppermost mare.) Check out the small chart top of next column.

© Gary Isherwood

A very special thank you to all those who supported the event, bought instruments along and shared them with the public.

Lunar Observing

Many members sent in their images of the Moon they had taken on the two nights – and other pictures of the team setting up (some appear on our website). At first glance, all the lunar pictures look a bit 'samey' but, they all show differing aspects of the Moon and methods of taking the pictures. A thanks to Andy Lee helping out a damsel in distress with her camera settings and thanks also to Paul Holden of The Worthing Journal who had been advertising the event for the last few months in that monthly magazine.

© Mike Williams

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The Southern Astronomer No.85 – October 2015 InOMN continued

Telescopes at Honeysuckle Lane

© Maria Manser

© Mike Williams

For those of us who needed to be a bit nearer home for the eclipse we got to see, what I though was quite a dark eclipse (see previous issue) but none the less a fine one.

Here are just a few of the many pictures that members took:

© Chris Pennells

© Graham Dargonne

Perigee Harvest Moon - Total Lunar Eclipse A week after the InOMN evenings were lucky once again with the weather as the total lunar eclipse coincided exactly with a perigee-Moon. The media seemed very fast to point out that this would be the “last eclipse” until 2033 – the last what. Lunar eclipse or perigee-Moon eclipse?

Actually, the next total lunar eclipse visible from the UK will be during the summer of 2018, however we get to see the latter (interesting) stages of it as it begins while the Moon is below our horizon. The next all-nighter will occur just over six months later in late January 2019 , so something for the diary!!

As for the perigee-Moon lunar eclipse of October 2033 the UK media have gone on about - it won't even be visible from the UK!

A montage of before, during and after totality

© Steve Bassett

As someone recently pointed out, when we see the shadow of the earth on the face of the Moon we are seeing every terrestrial sunrise and sunset at the same time. An impressive thought.

But, back to this year. As mentioned earlier, the weather pixies were kind to us and a virtually cloud free sky allowed many millions of people world wide to As Jan Halls wrote on the groups Facebook page: see one of natures most glorious and ponderous events to occur. Unlike a solar eclipse when the maximum moment is very brief and may last anything What a wonderful eclipse that was last night or should I say earlier this from a few seconds to a few minutes, a total lunar eclipse takes its time. morning....I just grabbed a pair of binoculars and sat and watched it and Though we had not planned any formal event due to the lateness of the hour, totally enjoyed doing so. It was such a dark one, at mid eclipse from where we are, it was very plain to see the stars around the Moon, even naked-eye some members did meet up at Honeysuckle Lane to do some observing as and I can't recall the last time I saw that, that it certainly looked like the often well glimpse the eclipse. described Christmas Pudding, that it was just wonderful to watch...and I am, like most of us are without doubt, completely shattered this morning but oh A good night was had by all, except for one interlude during the early hours my was it worth it! … when a woman turned up to walk her dogs which proceeded to run amok amongst the telescopes, steal sandwiches and generally make a nuisance of themselves (the dogs, not the lady.) When remonstrated with, the lady in question gave our colleagues a mouthful of abuse and threatened to have the police on them for being at a public place.

... at mid eclipse, Orion and Taurus were so clear that it was just so beautiful even if Sirius was visible and seeing those rise in the east its saying that winter is on the way! Just as the Moon entered full eclipse, I believe I glimpsed a small fast moving binocular meteor. Also what topped everything about this event, it was for once totally clear.

She was warmly invited to call the police – but she didn't. As a good friend of mine would say, “It takes all kinds” or some such homily. Apart from Andy's sandwiches it actually gave everyone a bit of a laugh!

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The Southern Astronomer No.85 – October 2015

October Workshop and AGM This month sees another 'year' ending and a new one beginning – the 2014/15 year ends with our AGM where we get to catch up on our group finances and of course the appearance of any volunteers who are willing to help run the group in the shape of a Co-ordinator, Treasurer, Editor, Website manager. This will take only a few minutes before we get on with the main business in hand.

The 2015/16 year begins with a guest speaker, Steve Richards of the Chanctonbury Observatory based in Wiston near Steyning. Readers of the Sky At Night magazine will be familiar with him as he is a regular contributor to that periodical. He is also the author of Making Every Photon Count – a book written to help anyone wishing to take photographs of the night sky.

He will have some of these books with him and will be available for sale at £19 (usual price £21.75, First Light Optics). No doubt Steve will be happy to sign them as well if asked.

More and more members are wanting to capture via the medium of photography the beauty of the night sky – a result in the development of light © Sophie Garbo sensitive chips of 30 years ago which we are now reaping the benefits of.

This talk will start them on their way. If imaging the sky is not your thing, don't worry as there will be some examples of pictures taken from the Wiston observatory site. Alternately you could try and take a look in at the website, http://www.skyatnightimages.co.uk/ for some of the latest images.

After the break and a chance to have a chat and a cup of tea or coffee and some cake, we will be looking at some of the images that members have taken over the last month or so and what PC software you may find useful.

As a precursor, the December workshop – this will be a free meeting (no entry fee at the door) and we will have a peek at what astronomy we can look forward to during 2016. Let us hope for clear skies over the coming year.

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© Andy Spencer

In the above pictures, both Sophie Garbo and Andy Spencer captured a bluegreen tinge to the eclipsed lunar disk – possibly the effects of ozone in the Earth's atmosphere.

There are so many pictures of the eclipse I cannot include them all – if you are still wading through the many pictures you took, why not post them, if you can to the group Flickr page where they will be seen by a wide audience.

Well done to to members Graham Green and James West getting their pictures on local television news (BBC South Today) and Brian Halls for his picture appearing on BBC South-East Today.

I will try and include further photographs of the event in the next issue of the newsletter, due out at the end of October.

Send your pictures to editor@worthingastronomers.org.uk on or before the closing date - 15th October.

An atmospheric image by Andy Lee

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© Andy T Lee Photography

The Southern Astronomer No.85 – October 2015

OBSERVING NOTES October All times are expressed as Universal (UT) and can be considered the same as GMT (BST minus 1 hour).

Information below, and all sky-map on page 8, is for the 15th of the month unless stated. BST changes on October 25 to GMT so no corrections needed after that date for UK readers. Evenings are now darkening earlier and earlier, and this is the time for meteor watching as several showers coincide.

S

unspot activity over the last couple of months has been quiet. So much so This of course is not to say that volcanism did not play any part. The dark lunar that the sunspot numbers for July and August were considerably down on plains that cover much of the face of the Moon are the remains of dried up lava previous months. flows that were triggered by the impacts.

Try and take a look at the crater Copernicus – an easy object even a small 'scope.. This massive crater is the centre of a ray system that makes itself more apparent as the Moon heads towards full on the 27th. The crater is impressive, with its terraced internal walls but look carefully around the outer areas surrounding the crater.

The chart above shows the latter part of the previous cycle and all the present one. You can clearly see that sunspot numbers are much lower than their counter parts of the previous cycle. The black lines are the raw observed sunspot numbers; the blue line is a statistically smoothed average based upon the raw observed data while the red line is the predicted smoothed average.

A cycle minimum is expected about 2020. It can be seen that sunspot numbers at our recent maximum are only equal to the numbers seen during the descending trend of the previous cycle. It may be a very long minimum.

In the meantime regular sunspot observers, members Brian States and Brian Halls keep observing the Sun when they can. The Sun was observed on 28 days (BS) and 7 days (BH). The average daily sunspot number generated by these two members was 45.7 (AAVSO 51.3; BAA xx.x). As mentioned earlier, this continues a drop in sunspot numbers we have seen over the last few months.

Copernicus

© Brian Halls

Look to the upper right in the above picture and you will notice lots of small craters ; same features appear in the lower left and right hand corners as well.

It is believed that these small craters were created by the debris sent out by the impactor that created Copernicus. The keyhole like feature below Copernicus is the crater Fauth and that too is also believed to have been caused by large debris that excavated the doublet-crater at the same time.

The Moon is once more increasing in altitude in the sky. With the total eclipse now passed (the next visible total in the UK will be July 2018 and then only part of it) I hope that more will observe our nearest neighbour in the sky as it changes its phases night to night.

The bright red star Aldabaran (α-Tauri) is occulted by the Moon during the evening of October 29 at 21h 46m 54s, reappearing from behind the Moon at 22h 45m 37s (exact times will vary according to your location.) As the Moon A newcomer to the hobby and viewing the Moon for the first time through a rises that evening it will be passing through the Hyades open cluster in Taurus telescope will be amazed at the lunar features – many of them craters or crater like formations – ranging from small tiny craters a few kilometres across and the opportunity to observe other stars disappear behind the Moon and then reappear will be available (below). to ones that are so large they are described as walled plains, hundreds of kilometres in diameter.

What caused them? This was the argument for many hundreds of years. For many, including the late Sir Patrick Moore, craters were the result of volcanic activity (the endogenic theory). The theory went that on the young Moon, fires within our satellite produced volcanic activity with some volcano's being massive structures. These volcano's then collapsed in massive events leaving a geological formation known as a caldera in their place – a crater like structure.

Caldera's can be found on Earth. For example, under the sea at Santorini in the Greek islands is a caldera, the remains of a massive volcanic blast that destroyed the once large volcanic mountain that stood there, about 3500 years ago (and the Minoan civilisation that was existing about that time.) The Earth caldera's however are minnows when compared with some of the large hypothetical volcano's that were supposed to have inhabited the Moon.

During the 1940's the theory that the craters on the Moon were the result of impacts by other bodies (exogenic theory) became popular though the theory had been around a long time before that. Detailed lunar studies, first telescopically, then unmanned probes, and finally manned lunar landings, proved that nearly all the lunar surface was sculptured by asteroid or meteor impacts.

Aldabaran prior to occultation

Graphic by Stellarium

The editor welcomes images of the Moon for publishing in the newsletter and or the website. Email, with details to editor@worthingastronomers.org.uk

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The Southern Astronomer No.85 – October 2015 Observing Notes for October continued

the time of maximum though a good idea is to look after nightfall the evening before as the radiant is very nearly overhead. The radiant is close to the 'head' of the Dragon.

Three of the brighter Planets are visible in the morning sky, Jupiter, Mars and Venus making a show almost due East at about 0430UT with Venus and Jupiter coming close to each other on the 25th (below). Mars lays just below.

Another shower is the Southern Taurids which occur between September and November. The radiant drifts across the night sky slowly. During October the radiant is between Aries and close to the 'tail' of the constellation of Cetus, before ending up close to the Hyades open cluster in Taurus.

The Northern Taurids radiant lays a little more towards Aries and is also beginning to be more active during October though the show as they say, really kicks off next month for what is believed will be a very favourable shower – details in the November issue.

A major shower this month is the Orionids. They begin to appear mid-month with maximum occurring about the 22nd. As the Moon is new there will be little light problems from this source. A signature of the shower are fast moving meteors with persistent trains.

The multiple maximum meteor shower the Piscids have their last maximum during the early hours of October 13.

The nights are now very much getting darker. The early morning hours of the total lunar eclipse revealed how star studded the night sky can be, even from an urban and 'light-polluted' site. Stellar and Deep Sky objects are now much more visible as the nights slowly darken.

The Milky Way remains well presented to us almost overhead, spreading from the eastern to western horizon.

Jupiter (left) and Venus (right)

From a dark site, the Milky Way looks like a fine cloud but, even the smallest of optical aid – small binoculars or telescope will reveal that 'mist' to be stars in their countless multitude.

Graphic by Stellarium

Venus reaches western elongation on the morning of October 26 – it will appear through a small telescope (or even a really good pair of binoculars) as Amongst that mist are stars which are doubles or multiple star systems – stars a half-moon shape. As the days pass from now on, the angular diameter of the that are truly associated with each other, many of differing colours. Other stars planet will slowly decrease as the phase of Venus slowly heads to 'full' which are known as variable, stars that fluctuate in their own brightness, due to the presence of nearby orbiting stars or to the nuclear changes actually taking place within the stars themselves.

Also amongst the stars are clusters of stars, stars that are massed together in varying types of arrangements. Some objects are not always seem obvious as they are made up of stellar gas (nebula), objects like the Orion nebula M42, which is a favourite of many stargazers during the winter nights. It is in these clouds that new stars are being born and this star formation is being witnessed by professional astronomers using telescopes like the Hubble Space Telescope.

There are other nebulae that we see are the leftovers of the complete opposite to stellar birth, materials leftover from the devastating death throws of massive stars that blast themselves apart as supernovae.

This dust and gas will eventually be recycled as gravitational actions take place and young stars will form.

The process then starts again. Our own Sun evolved from such a cloudy remnant of a long dead star. The very blood in our veins contains iron – forged in the dying moments of a long dead massive star that had gone through the nuclear reaction processes until only iron was left becoming a supernova.

Venus will look like the half disk on the extreme right in the above diagram (above)

will occur in 2016.

All these objects mentioned above are part of of our own Milky Way galaxy but there are also objects that lay beyond our local 'island' of the galaxy. These are galaxies in their own right and they all contain the many objects that exist in our own galaxy – variable stars, double stars, nebula and star clusters.

Mars' angular diameter is 4”(arc-seconds) and though reasonably bright at 1.7m surface detail will be beyond the reach of most moderate instruments.

Jupiter lays close to Venus. It is a fair 32” in angular diameter and bright at -1.6m.

One such deep sky object is M33, which over the coming months will appear almost overhead and well positioned for observing. Alternately known as the The dark mornings are predisposed towards early observing sessions and Pinwheel Galaxy it is about 5m. with reasonable attention, if found in the pre-light dusk of the morning they can be followed into a fairly light sky – a good way to observe Venus without it A more famous neighbour is the Andromeda Galaxy – M31. It is 3m but a being too dazzling. diffuse object but one that is worth looking for – even with the naked eye and under skies of with moderate light pollution. I have glimpsed it from my own Evening planets are the faint Uranus and Neptune, low in the south sky, with urban back garden under just such conditions.

Saturn disappearing into the twilight and setting about an hour and half after the Sun. A number of deep sky objects are marked on the chart, next page. Hopefully you will get a chance to look at them. Due to space this month (no pun There are no bright Comets expected to be visible during the month but there intended) due to coverage of the lunar eclipse we'll have a deep sky issue of a few lesser known Meteor showers such as the Draconids that appear early the newsletter next month when we will do some star hopping. in the month. As the name implies they appear to radiate from a point in th Draco. It is active between October 6 and 10 with the predawn of the 9 being.

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The Southern Astronomer No.85 – October 2015

The Night Sky from Worthing at or around 21.30UT mid-month

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Graphic by Carte du Ceil

The Southern Astronomer No.85 – October 2015

WORTHING ASTRONOMERS AGM 2014 Held at the Cornwall Room GURC Durrington, 04/10/2014 1. Minutes of AGM 2013.

The Minutes were read out and there being no Matters Arising from the were proposed by Mike Williams and seconded by Chris Pennells.

2. Acceptance Of Accounts 2013-2014 The Accounts had been received and audited and there being no matters arising were proposed by Mike Williams and seconded by Graham Williams.

3. Election of Co-Ordinator and Treasurer For 2014-2015 There being no other nominees for either of these posts, the current holders of Co-Ordinator (Brian Halls) and Treasurer (Jan Halls) were re-elected by all members present.

4. AOB Jan Halls announced that Badges on shirts and the name of Worthing Astronomers on Hi-Viz jackets were going to have to be done commercially in future. Up until now Jan had been able to supply the aforementioned embroideries but due to difficulty of access to consumables, plus the now large expense, this was going to be no longer feasible to do privately as this was now more easily available commercially at more competitive prices.

Chris Pennells informed those present that if we wished to keep the use of the projector which was officially currently on loan, we could make an offer of £50 to purchase it. It was agreed by the membership that Worthing Astronomers would purchase the projector for £50.

The meeting was then closed and the normal format was resumed.

TREASURER REPORT - 2nd October 2015 Once more I am pleased to announce that our funds are in a very healthy state and again we have made a small profit though our main purpose is to cover expenses that are light, but have seen a slight increase this year.

First and foremost thanks go to all our members who have made a donation during the year, as well as those who attend our meetings and support the group with their entry fee.

April was our last meeting at the Goring United Reformed Church, which had been hired at a reasonable cost, but needing an extra half an hour for the meeting that month, we were charged for another hour which turned out to be a somewhat expensive meeting. Having outgrown the hall, we looked around for another venue which we were successful in finding, were able to extend our meeting time to three hours instead of two and also providing a grass and hard standing area for telescopes to set up, as was done at the August meeting for just a further £5!

Midway during the year we changed Bank Accounts from Natwest to Santander, because of a mess up made by the bank who was in no hurry to sort it out. We at lease, were given an apology.

The biggest outlay of this year was obtaining our own Public Liability Insurance which is not only useful on our club nights but also cover us for seafront and other public meetings. Other purchases were a projection screen (made before we moved to a hall that has one installed) and the fee that allowed us to attend Sompting Festival which sadly due to poor advertising from the organisers did not have many visitors though our members supported us well.

We have had David Woods from HantsAstro speak to us on two occasions and hope to have other speakers in the future, another advantage that our funds are giving to us.

Many thanks for electing me at the last AGM and on a personal note, I hope I will be able to continue to do so for another year, but any replacement will be a worthy choice, and once again a thank you, to you the members for your support with your donations and attendance at the meetings and last but not least Chris Pennells who has done a superb job of auditing the books once again.

Jan Halls

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The Southern Astronomer No.85 – October 2015

Worthing Astronomers Income Over Expenditure 01/10/2014 - 30/09/2015 JE Halls Sept 30th 2015

INCOME 01/10/2015 - 30/09/2015 Donations FAS Calendars Bank Apology Door Entry

168.99 84.00 50.00 577.00 879.99

EXPENDITURE 01/10/2014 – 30/09/2015 Hall Hire 232.50 FAS Calenders Purchase 54.00 Insurance & PLI 164.80 Sundries 41.94 Refreshments 39.59 Projector Screen Purchase 20.00 Speaker Fees 20.00 572.83

Period 01/10/2014 - 30/09/2015 has shown a profit of £307.16 Total Cash £10.24 Bank Account £570.77

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