Apr 282013
The NWFAA started its 2013 public star gaze season at Henderson Beach State Park this year. It was a very good start. Tom Haugh arrived early enough to provide several early birds with views of the sun through his Meade 8″ SCT. By the time it got dark, Ken Leone, Frank Atchison, Dennis Hausch and Chuck Lynch had joined in the fun.
Tom explains how to use the sky maps.
Sky charts were handed out to the assembling guest observers and instructions on using them were briefed.
The guest observers start to assemble.
Jupiter was first up as it became visible well before dark. As the skies continued to darken, many more objects came under scrutiny. The Great Orion Nebula, Alcor & Mizar, and a whole list of Messier objects soon filled the eyepieces.
Ken Leone explains how he sets up and aligns his scope.
By then Ken Sharp had arrived and setup his telescope. He showed several guest observers how to attach their cameras to his telescope and let them try their hands at astrophotography. Matt Spidell also arrived with a surplus Amici prism which provided surprisingly bright spectra from the terrestrial lights that were visible.
The skies were quite clear and, for Henderson Beach, quite dry. This led to less sky glow than we are used to. However, it didn’t help a whole lot with Saturn as it crawled up over the eastern horizon. By then only a few die-hard observers were left to see it and we wrapped up soon after. All in all, a great start to the 2013 season.
Thanks go to Frank Atchison for the event photos.