Thanks to the very hard work of EAS members, and the interest and support of the people who came along to it, our Stargazing Live “MoonWatch” last Thursday night – January 14th – at the Brewery Arts Centre was a great success!

Thankfully the sky was beautifully clear after sunset, and at half past four, as we set up the first of the half a dozen or so telescopes which we gathered in the Brewery garden for our event, the Moon was shining high and bright above us, and the view of its mountains, craters and seas was already spectacular.

It was already a very cold evening, and got colder and colder as the time passed, but a steady flow of people wanting to see the Moon through our telescopes kept us warm and busy! It was great to have so many kids there, and there were lots of excited shouts and gasps as they looked at the Moon through a telescope for the first time, marveling at the detailed view of its deep craters, jagged mountain ranges and dark grey seas. And they were even more excited when they were able to hold a big metal meteorite, and then a piece of the Moon itself…!

By the time we packed our gear away at 8pm, after almost four hours at the Brewery, we were all pretty frozen, but 50 or so people had seen the Moon through our telescopes, asked lots of questions, and even expressed interest in coming along to one of our meetings, so it had definitely been worth it.

Thanks to everyone who came along to support our event, from the members of the Society to the members of the public. And a special thank you to the Brewery Arts Centre for continuing to make us so welcome there.

To support the BBC’s “Stargazing Live” programmes we’re holding another of our popular “MoonWatch” events at the Brewery Arts Centre on January 14th… full details here…

Due to the poor weather forecast and road conditions, there will be no EAS GEMINID WATCH tonight.

At the moment the weather forecast is not good for Saturday night at all, lots of cloud with no breaks, so as of 10am on Friday morning it looks unlikely there’ll be an EAS Geminid Watch. But forecasts change, so please check back here later tomorrow for a further update.

Thanks!

StuA

Everyone please note, Monday night’s meeting is STILL ON.

I heard back from Anna that there is no flooding there, so tomorrow night (Monday 8th) is still our Christmas social night. If you’re coming, bring some festive food to share, and something to drink while you’re eating. There’ll be a very brief news round up, then one of Graham’s spectacularly entertaining quizes, then we just hit the buffet table.

Look forward to seeing you all there!

Stu

At the start of the month we were delighted to welcome back one of our very favourite guest speakers – Nick Howes, who drove an incredibly long way to come and give us a passionate talk “The Legacy of Apollo”. Nick’s lavishly-illustrated talk took us through the glory of the Apollo missions, from the birth of the Apollo program to the final footsteps left on the Moon, and asked: what next? When will we go back? And why haven’t we been back already? It was a fascinating talk, which everyone in the large audience enjoyed.

After the talk Nick showed our members some pieces of actual Apollo hardware, including some very special items which had flown in space on Apollo missions. Nick also brought lots of meteorites with him and many members bought their own personal “piece of space” before Nick joined us across the road in the local pub for a well-deserved drink and bite to eat, before setting off on a long drive back down south again.

It was a fantastic night, and we all hugely appreciated Nick’s visit.

Before Nick’s talk, the meeting began with a round-up of recent astronomy and space news. There were reports of the recent beautiful display of the northern lights which was visible from Cumbria and was observed by several EAS members…

The meeting also heard about the striking “parade of planets” which has been on view in the eastern sky before dawn. Over the past few weeks, Venus, Jupiter and Mars have been coming together in the east, shining like stars in the hours before dawn, and several EAS members have been photographing them…

The next astronomical event we will be observing (or TRYING to observe!) is Comet CATALINA, a comet which has been delighting observers in the southern hemisphere for a while now but has not been visible this far north. However, that will change in a couple of weeks time, when Catalina pokes its head over the eastern horizon before dawn, and then well start to look for it. Here’s where it will be at the end of the month, and in early December, an hour or so before sunrise…

Finally for this update, we have a MOONWATCH scheduled for next weekend. Because the Brewery Arts Centre will be holding its annual and hugely popular “Mountain Festival” we can’t use their garden that evening, so we’ll be using an alternative observing venue. Keep checking this blog, and the “Meetings ad events” page, for updates and details.

All you need to know about the total eclipse of the Moon is here…

https://cumbriansky.wordpress.com/2015/09/09/guide-to-the-september-28th-total-lunar-eclipse/

Seven members of the Society recently travelled over to Dalby Forest in North Yorkshire to attend the Scarborough and Ryedale AS “Starfest”, and had a great time! With almost one line of the campsite all to ourselves, (“Eddington Street”), we set up in our camper vans, tents, caravans and folding campers and enjoyed four days of astronomy fun. We saw stars on two of those four nights, with the Saturday night gifting us with really clear, starry skies, a majestic view of the Milky Way and lots of Perseid meteors. Happy to report that our team won the astronomy Pub Quiz on the Sunday night, too! Full report at the next meeting, but here are some photos to give you a flavour of the weekend…

Members please note that this observing event, due to be held on Saturday August 22nd, has been postponed and will now be held later in the year, on a date to be confirmed.

If it’s clear where you are in the UK late tonight (or anywhere in northern hemisphere), keep an eye out for more shooting stars than usual, as we are approaching the peak of the annual Perseid (“purr-see-id”) meteor shower. You might have heard about this already, because there are lots of sensationalist memes and “alerts” and doing the rounds on Facebook and Twitter about this, some of them making quite outrageous predictions for “thousands of shooting stars falling from the sky!” But the truth is rather less dramatic…

Basically, although tonight is the main night, over the next few nights, if you have a clear sky around midnight and into the early hours before dawn, you have a good chance of seeing more shooting stars than usual. The obvious question at this point is: “How many???” Well, the actual number you see will depend on a few things, mainly how long you are willing to watch for them, and where you watch for them from. If you live in a town or city, you *might* catch a handful, if you’re lucky, just standing on your doorstep in your slippers after dark, looking at the small patch of sky visible above your garden, but because of the small area of sky you’ll be looking at, and because of all the lights around you, you’ll be lucky if you see more than a dozen or so, probably. However, if you live somewhere less populated – or if you make a bit of an effort and get away from home to somewhere less populated, somewhere away from streetlights and illuminated buildings, and find somewhere darker, somewhere with a much “bigger” sky, you’ll have a better chance of seeing more shooting stars – common sense, really! Then you will have a good chance of seeing a lot more shooting stars than usual.

Just be aware that you will not be seeing a meteor shower as it’s usually shown on TV or in a film – when bright shooting stars zip across the sky one after the other, barely a second between them, sometimes half a dozen skipping across the sky at the same time. During a *real* meteor shower it’s typical to have to wait several minutes between shooting stars, and you might even go ten minutes or longer during the lulls. But then you might see several in quick succession, it’s totally random and unpredictable. But that’s part of the fun!

By the way, if you do go out and look for the shooting stars, after a while you’ll notice that they all appear to be coming out of one part of the sky, from the east – actually, from just beneath an easy to spot “W” of stars, a constellation called Cassiopeia. Although they can appear in any part of the sky – above you, behind you, off to your left or right – if you tracked them all back you’d see they are shooting out of the constellation of Perseus… hence the name of the shower, The Perseids…

As for how bright they will be, well, you will see the odd really bright one and a few might be strikingly bright, but most won’t be and you will see a lot of them “out of the corner of your eye”. This is an astronomical event you don’t need a telescope to enjoy because telescopes are utterly useless for watching meteors! Your naked eye is all you need. If you have a pair of binoculars tho, take them with you because the very brightest meteors can sometimes leave behind a ghostly, glowing trail in the sky, which can linger for several minutes after the shooting star itself has faded, twisting and coiling in the upper atmosphere before fading. But seeing any of those would be a bonus, don’t count on it!

So, tonight is the main night, but tomorrow night, and the night after, go out around midnight, wrap up warm, find as dark a place as possible, with as big a sky as possible, stay out as long as you can manage, and just enjoy whatever Nature gives us. You won’t see a sky full of blazing shooting stars, but you will see at least a few that will make you go “Wow!” and maybe even a couple that will take your breath away.

Good luck!

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EAS PERSEID WATCH EVENTS

Amazingly the forecast for tonight is for a clear sky across Cumbria, so members of the Eddington Astronomical Society will be heading out to observe the meteor shower. Because our membership is so scattered, and because different people prefer different observing sites, we are not having a *single* meteor watching event as such. But it is suggested that members who want to watch the shower in the company of others consider going to the following observing sites we have used before, I’m sure they’ll meet someone there!

HELSINGTON CHURCH: This is a very popular EAS observing site, but it’s not that good for watching this meteor shower because Perseus will be behind the church there, with trees in the way too. But if you go up you will definitely see more shooting stars than you would from home, just because it’s quite dark up there and offers a good view of the sky.

ORTON SCAR: basically go through the village of Orton, keep going up until you’re on the top of the hill there, and look for the big gravelly car park on the right hand side. There is a great view of a Big Sky up there, and it is dark too, so I’m sure there will be some EAS members there tonight.

OLD HUTTON CHURCH: If you don’t fancy driving all the way to Orton, just five or so minutes’ drive out of Kendal, through Oxenholme, this church car park offers a surprisingly dark and good view of the sky within easy reach of town. Several members have already arranged to meet up here tonight, from eleven, to watch the meteor shower, and you’d be welcome to join us. Just be aware that there are houses nearby so you will have to be quiet, no shrieks of “Ooh!” and “WOW!!” as bright meteors dash across the sky! 😉

Wherever you go – good luck!