Blue Mountains - Katoomba Airfield 7th Sept.

[mental4astro]

Hi all,

Election night is also session night at the Airfield this September - many thanks to Rod for making the Airfield available to us, :) .

I'm hoping for kinder conditions this time around. Not so cold. Less blowy. Better transparency. But, we'll take what we get I suppose. The combustion heater I'm sure will get fired up though as it still will be very cool.

Conditions certainly be much better. The first time I saw M33 was at the Airfield a couple of years back now. It was a naked eye object, a magnificent round patch in the sky. I hope to have such conditions again this time around.

Mental.

[AstroJason]

I'm in for this month as usual. See you guys there.

[MortonH]

I'll be there.

[eclipse]

Provisionally we will be there.

Les and Deb

[killswitch]

Will be there, see you guys there

[AG Hybrid]

See you guys there. I've got some new equipment I'll be looking forward to putting through its paces at a dark sky site.

[Wavytone]

Dang... I arrive back from the UK at 6am but I'm sure ill be too jet lagged to make it. At least I'll be out of this soup they call 'air' here.

[Camelopardalis]

Planning on it...but I'll probably need someone's help getting the scope polar aligned without the Pole star :)

[Camelopardalis]

Believe me, it works out really well. Nap in the afternoon and you'll be up all night :D worked for me back in June.

Btw, you think it's soup now, you want to go back in winter ;)

[AstroJason]

Sounds interesting Adrian, looking forward to seeing what it is you are bringing.

[AG Hybrid]

You probably won't find it too impressive Jason with your tricked out gear now. Haha.

[mr bruess]

I'll try to be there.

[AG Hybrid]

I'll be bring a couple extras with me this month. One is my work colleague and the other (his friend) is a astrophysicist. The conversations will hopefully be interesting.

[Steffen]

I shall prepare a catalogue of questions ;)

Cheers
Steffen.

[Camelopardalis]

How about some nice sexy plots? :D

[AG Hybrid]

Ahh well. Looks like my 2 guests are skipping this month and coming next month.

[ManUtdFans]

Sorry, how do I get the Katoomba Airfield?
Cannot locate on Google Map.
Note: I am new to Astronomy and have heard that is pretty good to shoot Star Gazing there?

Edit:
Yes, I got that from Google Map after another search. Can I goto the airfield by this route:
Penrith -> Great Western Highway
-> Station Street Exit -> Railway Parade -> Rutland Road -> Grand Canyon Road

[killswitch]

I noticed theyve been doing some backburning and its been very hazy even at my area.



Yes thats only way coming from Penrith.

[ManUtdFans]

Sorry what is backburning?

Anyway to know if the sky is clear or not on Sat night?

[Camelopardalis]

Could anyone suggest where I might get some red film to cover over the interior lights in my car? I mean, somewhere I can walk-in and buy it rather than mail order? It's either that or yank the fuse...

[AG Hybrid]

News agency or arts and craft stores.

[Steffen]

I use red electrical tape, from the supermarket.

Cheers
Steffen.

[mental4astro]

Backburning is the controlled burning of bushland to reduce fuel in bushfire prone areas. These burns though controlled, still can produce a lot if smoke haze that in turn affects seeing quality. The affect also depends on wind direction.

It is always a good idea to check this thread to see how conditions are tending if favourable or not for the session, be this for backburning or weather conditions. There are also several websites that can be checked for forecast reports, such as the BOM site, & a few others.

I'll post a couple of links & pics of the Airfield later tonight.

Dunk, as Adrian said, you can get red cellophane from newsagents & $2 shops.

[mental4astro]

A couple of local weather forecast and current links

* BOM Katoomba forecast (http://www.bom.gov.au/nsw/forecasts/katoomba.shtml)

* Live webcam at Scenic World at Katoomba (http://www.scenicworld.com.au/explore-our-world/take-a-look/web-cam/). You can take control of the camera to pan across the landscape. Good site to help gauge the immediate conditions up there.

A couple of pictures of getting to the Airfield below too. The first is a map, with detail in heading west from Katoomba. The second is a pic of the Airfield and the track to follow to the set up area. On entering the Airfield, turn LEFT and head past the "No Entry" sign. Then turn right up the hill past the set of buildings. The set up slab is on the left next to the main runway.

[Camelopardalis]

newagents...wow, unexpected! Thanks chaps I'll go hunting... failing that, electrical tape it is :)

I'm sure I've got a piece of red theatre lighting film here somewhere, knew exactly where it was in the old house :mad2:

[Wavytone]

Dunk, most newsagents have red cellophane for wrapping things. What I do is put some tissue paper over the lens first to diffuse and soften the light, then a couple of layers of red cellophane over that. A rubber band or tape will hold it it all together.

[Camelopardalis]

OK, so I have to ask, being relatively new to the country and all... what is red cellophane otherwise used for here that means it's readily available? :D

[ManUtdFans]

Is Katoomba AirField normally closed at night and need special permission for entering the field?
I think I'll go there to take some sky shots but do not want to be myself alone there just in case if it is dangerous to be there alone?

[AstroJason]

Hi Alan,

You wont be able to go and enter the airfield at any other time other than the dates Alex or Peter can go.

Also probably best practice that when you do go to any dark sky site that you don't go alone, no matter where it is.

Cheers,

Jason

[ManUtdFans]

Hi Jason, thank you for your reminder. You might have saved my life.
So when you guys will be there this Sat night?

[mental4astro]

I'm hoping to get there around 5:30. The Airfield will be open all day, & the gate will be left open for us, so if you are early it won't be a problem. If you are early, just drop by the office to let Rod know you're there for the astro session. There are aircraft kept there, so it is polite to announce yourself if you are early.

[Camelopardalis]

I'm know I'm always asking, but here's another question...

Anyone with experience of Synscan firmware updates going? I think mine is on 3.27 or earlier :( and I can't find my USB-serial converter...it's got to be in one of these boxes somewhere in the house of perpetual chaos :D

[mental4astro]

On those occasions when the Airfield isn't available, there are two other sites we use that can be also accessed at any time, Hargraves Lookout & Mt Blackheath Lookout. Both of these are accessed via Blackheath down the same road on the western side of the railway tracks. A fork in the road then diverts to each location.

Hargraves has a wider view of the sky than Mt Blackheath, but it is completely exposed to wind due to being on a spur, & is freaking freezing in winter. I'd say the coldest place in the entire Blue Mountains. The Eastern horizon of Mt Blackheath is limited due to the tree line, but it is much more protected. The setup area at Hargraves is also 25/30m from the parking area, and over soft gravel. At Mt Blackheath you setup where you park. One good thing about both sites is there are established fireplaces where you can safely light a campfire.

Two words of caution with both these sites: Roos are commonly found here, & real care needs to be exercised when driving through here between sunset & dawn when these animals are active. I nearly collected two of them last time I was at Mt Blackheath - scared two years out of me! The other is, while both areas are very remote, they are still public areas & it is always best to go with at least one mate.

This is why we value so much the opportunity that Rod affords us all with access to the Airfield - it's private land AND safe.

Good time now to remind folks that the hat gets passed around for the gift of a slab of beer for Rod. He doesn't ask us for any money for his goodwill - we have the Airfield to ourselves all night, with access to the office building to sleep in if we need a place to crash, & the combustion heater on those freezing cold nights. The gift is the least we can do to say thanks.

Dunk, sorry mate, I can't offer anything on your question. I'll leave that to someone who knows.

[Wavytone]

... And wombats, which roam after dusk on the Shipley plateau.

[Jcro]

I'll be there! Looking forward to meeting everyone and picking their brains...

James

[rogerco]

Just to let you know the following HR burns are planned in the next few days:-

Thursday - Friday :- Katoomba North approx. 50 hectares between Medlow Bath and North Katoomba. (sorry nothing more exact).

Friday - Saturday:- West street Katoomba 4 hectares

Both of these should be out by Saturday night but if we do not have any wind the smoke from the fires may linger around (last Saturdays burn at Glenbrook was still noticeable in the lower mountains on Monday).

Hope you have a good night
Roger

[Camelopardalis]

Looks like forecast is bringing plenty of our old friend the wind, but a risk of precipitation also, hope that risk reduces!

[ManUtdFans]

Just wanted to know normally how many of you guys will be there together for this sort of meetings?

[mental4astro]

We've had as few a 1, me :D, and as many as two dozen. Average I'd say a 10. Last month there were 11.

Thanks for the note on backburning activity, Roger, :) . Greatly appreciated.

Mental.

[mental4astro]

In case anyone who hasn't been there before, we are welcome to stay overnight. There is no actual quitting time. It's all upto you when you've had enough. We are also welcome to crash in the office building for some shut eye. Sometimes this is the better option so not to drive fatigued.

[ManUtdFans]

Tonight is a full moon night. Do you think Sat night is a good time to shoot night sky (has galaxy in the photo)?
I will shoot without scope but DSLR only.

Edit:
My mistake, should be new moon.

[Camelopardalis]

Alan, new moon is the perfect time to use your camera as there will be no interference from the Moon all night long :)

With a DSLR you should be able to get excellent results, conditions permitting. This is one I took with my point and shoot (single 15 second exposure) attached to the top of my scope a couple of months back, so it can only get better than this!

[ManUtdFans]

Oh...I thought we need a dark sky to shoot the 'galaxy'? The new moon will be too bright to 'see' the galaxy near by. I guess it is perfect if no moon at all, that's what I thought.
Sorry I mean shoot with DSLR only.
I'm pretty confused :(

[Camelopardalis]

New Moon is when the Moon is near the Sun in the sky, so it sets when the the Sun sets giving us a nice long dark night without the Moon spoiling the view of everything faint, like you say. Full Moon is when the Moon is opposite the Sun and is visible all night (cloud permitting!) but also reflects the highest amount of light to earth, being a big bright light bulb spoiling the view of everything else faint.

The observing sessions at the Airfield fall around New Moon so we get the darkest sky and best chances to view whatever objects are available, excluding the Moon of course :)

[andyc]

I'd like to come along too if that's ok. Provisional, depending on weather and a few other things, but if there's a chance I'd love to get the scope out at a dark site again, having recently moved to Sydney :)

Thanks to Alex for organising this!

[ManUtdFans]

So the moon will not be in the night sky when it is new moon night?
Please correct me if I am wrongly interpret your explanation.

Edited:
I just went outside of my house, looked up the sky could not find the moon.

[noswonky]

That is correct. New moon is when the Moon is not visible in the sky.

[AG Hybrid]

I think we have been thwarted. The weather does not look good for tomorrow if BOM is anything to go buy. Perhapes we should try to reschedule for next week? If the airfield isnt available maybe Hargraves?

[killswitch]

I caught a fever this week :(.. cant make it tomorow.

Next week at hargraves sounds good if i am well by then.

[ManUtdFans]

Is Hargraves near Mudgee?

[rogerco]

Negative, Hargraves is a lookout south of Blackheath (Blue Mountains)

[eclipse]

We can't make it tomorrow.

Les and Deb

[ManUtdFans]

Is this the one?
Hargraves Lookout, Shipley Road, Megalong NSW

[mental4astro]

:thumbsup:

Yep, that's it. See post No. 33 in this thread about it.

[Wavytone]

Good luck to those going, the forecast looks good !

See yo next month hopefully.

[AG Hybrid]

According to BOM satellite maps most of the cloud mass has moved on in the night. We may just be in with a chance tonight.

[Steffen]

I fell for the "it's probably cloudy" trap before, only to wake up to reports of a great observing night. Between BOM, Apanel and SkippySky forecasts there is still a substantial degree of uncertainty. Unless it's raining at 4pm I'm going.

Cheers
Steffen.

[AG Hybrid]

Well see you there then.

[ManUtdFans]

Have you guys been here:
Linden Observation Site
105 Glossop Road, Linden, NSW, 2778

Is this site locked the gate during normal nights? Or can I just walk into the area and observe night sky?

[AstroJason]

Looking like its worth going tonight. Ill be there by around 5:30ish

[Steffen]

WSAAG (http://wsaag.org) are holding observing nights on Saturdays around new moon, such as today. Visitors are welcome, for a small contribution. The site has an excellent northern horizon, and they also have a massive 30" Dob there, recently fitted with Argo Navis and ServoCat and given a general makeover by Reter Read of SDM.

Overall the Linden site is not as spacious and flat as the Airfield, but can still accommodate a fair number of people. If you've never been there before you should arrive well before dark the first time.

Cheers
Steffen (WSAAG member)

[andyc]

The most useful tool I've found for deciding if it's likely to be clear/cloudy on the day are near real-time hourly satellite images (http://realtime2.bsch.au.com/vis_sat2.html?region=aus&loop=no&images=&allday=&start=&stop=)from the Brisbane storm chasers. It's much higher resolution than the publicly-available BoM images, and with practice you can easily track weather systems, low and high cloud bands, fog or storms across Australia. The facility to animate the hourly images is incredibly handy, as is zooming in to state level (NSW 09:33am image attached).

Use the animations of visible light images during the day to track the progress/development of a weather system, bearing in mind things like patches of fast high clouds crossing a whole state in a few hours, much faster than a frontal system! You can use the IR images to track high cold clouds overnight, but the low clouds (e.g. fog, or Melbourne winter cloud off the ocean) don't show up well in night-time IR over land as they're near the same temperature as the ground.

Today looks very promising - keep an eye on the high cloud over the SA/NSW border in case it extends eastwards later on, but the front modelled in SkippySky as bringing a lot of cloud has already fizzled almost entirely :D. If this continues, I'll hopefully head up to Katoomba for near sunset!


What's the form on departing late evening? I'm intending to leave maybe about 11pm, so I can get home and rested before a golf comp in the morning, but I don't want to disturb other observers!

[Steffen]

Thanks, bookmarked!

You can leave any time you like. Just warn people before starting your car, so they can look the other way or close their eyes. And make sure you don't need five other cars to move in order to get out ;)

Cheers
Steffen.

[ManUtdFans]

I see.
I have not been both places (Linden and Katoomba Airfield) before.
They are not far away from each other and not sure which one to go, should does not matter? I am from St Marys area.

[Irish stargazer]

Watching closely for a go/no go tonight

[AG Hybrid]

Thanks Andy, I have bookmarked that too. That is brilliant!
Ive been to Linden before. No one is stopping you from going there but personally I don't think its a dark enough location. Its decent though. Good view of the north. Not that great a view of the south unfortunately.

[AG Hybrid]

I'm thinking. All thunderbirds are go for tonight. I'll be leaving between 3:30 and 4 PM. Should get there a bit before 5:30

[MortonH]

Going for a snooze before heading out. I see there are a few fires around. Might be a night for globs and double stars.

[MortonH]

Forecast looks worse now. Having second thoughts...

[Steffen]

I've given up on the forecasters. All three forecasts I'm seeing (BOM, Apanel, SkippySky) are 100% wrong about the current conditions at my place right now. The storm chasers' satellite images are (naturally) spot on.

Cheers
Steffen.

[MortonH]

You're right. I had looked at Weatherzone but the satellite images from the storm chasers look much more promising.

And since I already carried my stuff down three flights of stairs, I'm going!

[mental4astro]

Just spoke with Rod at the Airfield. No go for tonight. He doesn't fancy chances of anything but over 50% cover for tonight.

Sorry lads. I'm not up for a 200km round trip for playing dodge ball with clouds. Peter's just pulled out too. I certainly don't want to get folks hopes up for tonight, so I'd rather say no good for this month, :(

Alex.

[AstroJason]

Damn I just finished packing the car too, like morton down 3 flights of stairs. All good Alex, I might still head out but to Hargraves. Anyone up for joining me there?

[AG Hybrid]

Yeah ill meet you at Hargraves. Not much else planned for tonight.

[Irish stargazer]

:(
Just loaded the car but likewise, not going to take the chance with a 3hr round trip

[AstroJason]

Cool Adrian, see you there. Might try get there earlier, say 5ish to get some sunset shots. Plus to avoid kangaroos/wombats on the road in.

[AG Hybrid]

Good idea

[Jcro]

Damn, that's a shame! Well, guess I'll meet you guys at Hargraves too. See you there!

[Camelopardalis]

I managed to stress my back yesterday, so I'm going to load up with the 8" and see how it's feeling....

It's going to be 6 before I can get there, best case scenario.

[Steffen]

My car is packed, too. I'm going to Linden.

Cheers
Steffen.

[Camelopardalis]

Heading for Hargraves, might be a little after 6 :(

[GeoffW1]

Yeh,

I'm out too, same reasoning. The Katoomba Webcam shows about 50-60% cloud. Good luck guys at the alternatives.

Cheers

[MortonH]

At Katoomba. will head to hagraves soon.

[andyc]

Was at katoomba last night, only two of us there! But it cleared around dusk to an evening of good seeing and transparency for a couple of hours. Some lovely deep sky views, great nebulae in the 16" and UHC, some pretty galaxies and globs, Pluto before the end of twilight too. Cut short by the second (terminal) band of cloud at about 9pm, but viewing was better than expected! Said hi and thanks to Rod, will chip in for extra beers for him next time.

[AG Hybrid]

5 of us turned up to Hargraves Lookout. Got some good viewing in early on but sort of gave up any serious observing at about 9:30PM. Chatted till a bit after midnight. Not the best night. But, not a bad one either.

[vic4loc]

Left early so didnt check the forum about most people cancelled. Only myself & Andy were there. Had really good viewing for about 2 hours, then as usual the clouds rolled in from the west.

Thanks again to Andy for letting me view through his large dob and seeing Pluto for the first time, it was just a faint dot :)

Victor.

[ManUtdFans]

Yes, noticed quite a few of you guys were not coming to Airfield so I went to Linden right after sunset and got a few shots of "galaxy" when the sky was clear for 1-2 hours and left at 8pm because most of the people there left as well.

[andyc]

You're welcome Victor. Next time, hopefully there'll be more time for you to view things through the scope rather than the frustrating challenge of setting up for photography in between clouds!

Attached are a couple of snaps from the evening at Katoomba - setting up in twilight with a look at Venus and Saturn (crescent moon peeping through the trees too), and a 2-shot pano of the Milky Way with the clouds threatening.

Looking forward to next time!