Member’s Observing Sessions

An appeal was made for volunteers to organise future Member’s Observing Sessions after this month.

Amateur Radio Astronomy

One of our members gave the first of a series of short talks on opportunities for amateurs using radio equipment.

After a brief history of Radio Astronomy, the possible motives were listed. The natural phenomena of meteors, Jupiter, the Sun and associated Aurora can be monitored together with satellite communications. Although radio astronomy can be carried out during the day at frequencies above 30MHz, frequencies below this are either absorbed or reflected back to earth or back into space by the Earth’s ionosphere. When sunspot activity is low after sunset there is an opportunity to listen to frequencies below 30MHz from space when the F layer of the ionosphere can fade a few hours after sunset. It is then possible to hear radio emissions from Jupiter between 15 and 38MHz.

An example of how to listen to meteors was given, and later some theory to explain why radio waves at different wavelengths are able to penetrate different media . An explanation on different antennas was given with an example of a simple YAGI antenna showing how this and Dishes are able to increase the Gain of a signal and improve the signal to noise ratio. The presentation finished with brief examples of equipment which will be discussed at later presentations.

Sky Notes for March 2019

Orion only a few more weeks. Betelgeuse at Right Ascension of 6 hrs sets six hours at the Equinox on the (1830 on the 21st).
from March 26th to 31st – early evening: Mars approaches the Pleiades and Hyades open clusters
on Friday, March 29th – before dawn around 05:45: Saturn just above the Moon above Uranus
See also Ian Morison’s Night Sky this Month on the Jodrell Bank site in Sky Notes and our EAS links page

News Roundup for March 2019

Our EAS member, Richard Rae, visited Complex 39A at Cape Canaveral ( the Appollo 11 launch pad) for the launch of the SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket which is now the workhorse for vehicles to and from the International Space Station.