Several members of the NWFAA spent Sunday the 29th up at the EAAA’s Munson observing site. They cleared a summer’s worth of growth from around the permanent telescope piers.
The Munson site is one of the panhandle’s darkest skies and is well inside an hours drive from the NWFAA’s theatre of operations.
Dave H. wishes to thank Frank A. and Chuck F. for their help.
There were no reports of injury.
Members of the NWFAA spent a couple of hours visiting a local observatory Sunday. It just wasn’t an optical observatory. Club member Dennis Hausch arranged and conducted a tour of the AN/FPS-85 radar site on Eglin A.F.B.
A couple of our members use their optical telescopes to track and identify asteroids, some of which are classified as ‘near earth objects’. The site C-6 radar is tasked to track man-made ‘near earth objects’ as well as some ‘deep space objects’. Here we had a clash of terminology. The C-6 definition of deep space object is anything out at geostationary/geosynchronous orbit while astronomy’s general definition of a deep space object is anything outside of the earth’s gravitational influence. An asteroid at geostationary/geosynchronous orbit is just about as ‘near earth’ as it gets without running into the planet.
The tour started with a presentation of site history and current mission. The next stop was to the maintenance walkway on the top of the antenna complex; the view is quite impressive. Computer rooms, hardware bays, maintenance labs and operations stations were visited and discussed. As several of our members are old radar heads from way back, the discussions got technical several times, with appropriate war stories retold.
We would like to thank the men and women of the 20th Space Control Squadron ops crew as well as the duty maintenance personnel for their time and informative briefings.
The “WEBELOS Weekend” event at Spanish Trails Scout Reservation south of Defuniak Springs was a short notice event. Maybe we should always hold short notice events. One of the on-site scout leaders told me the normal Friday attendance of around 75 boys doubled once word got out that telescopes would be set up on opening night. That should tell you how many boys plus additional parents, sisters, etc. showed up for the Sky View. We had brought 3 telescopes and the binocular chair, and they all had lines at one time or another during the event.
Early birds observe the moon before it got dark.
The evening started off with the International Space Station and the Hubble Space Telescope both making passes pretty much at the same time. The ISS crossed the northern horizon and Hubble crossed the south. The skies were just getting dark and most of the guest observers were still setting up tents and getting ready for the weekend, so the members of the NWFAA had the two satellites to themselves. While the ISS was very bright and easily visible, the Hubble was much dimmer and escaped notice.
Once the skies darkened, the cub scouts started arriving in packs (Sorry, couldn’t help myself). As soon as one group made the rounds and started to head back to their campground another group showed up and the observing started all over again. The evening followed that pattern until about 10:00 P.M. It was obvious that these boys came prepared as we answered many very challenging questions and our queries to them were answered promptly and correctly.
The sky over the scout reservation was very dark and the temperature dropped quite a bit leaving the observing overhead clear and steady. Tom targeted the moon for the entire night with his 6″ Newtonian. Once Jupiter cleared the tree line, Dennis targeted his 12″ Dobsonian on it for the most part. Dave’s binocular chair proved as popular as ever, looking at whatever the observer wanted to see. Frank and his 8″ SCT handled many targets of opportunity as they came into view. Tony, as usual, provided roving commentary, keeping observers not at an eyepiece entertained and educated. As is our normal practice, parents were required to view the objects with the scouts so as to share the experience and allow informed discussion with the boys. And as usual, the parents were glad for the invitation.
I would like to thank Cub Scout Den Leader Lori Shepard for the initial information about the “WEBELOS Weekend”. We would also like to thank the staff and leaders at the Spanish Trails Scout Reservation for the opportunity to share the night sky with so many young observers and for such a great evening. There was some talk of making this an annual event. That sounds like a good idea; it’s going to take that long for us to recover from this one.
Once again, members of the NWFAA supported Bass Pro-Shop’s Halloween event at the Destin Commons. As usual, the light pollution was awful. However, just as last year, there were plenty of guest observers (most in costume), lots of Milky Way’s to hand out, and several potential new members. Frank brought his 8″ Meade and Tony setup the college 12″ Dobsonian. Jupiter was the target of choice as the lighting precluded any deep sky object. Tom provided commentary, answered questions and displayed club imagery until the laptop power gave out. All in all, a good evening.
