Quark
25-07-2009, 03:38 PM
It was about 4:30pm as we started to setup our scopes on the bitumen helipad at Kinchega National park, near Menindee, in the far west of NSW. Fellow IIS’er Kev, aka Kevnool had come along with his 16” Dob and I had my 12” Lightbridge.
There was not a cloud in the sky, not a breath of wind; the only movement was from a Roo slowly making his way through the sand hills that surrounded the dry lake bed immediately to the west of our observing site. NSW National Parks Service had asked me to run an observing night as part of their “Starry Starry Night Tours” in celebration of the IYA. These tours were scheduled to co-incide with the school holidays for 2009 and this was the second observing night at Kinchega in this series.
My son Christopher came along to help me and Kev came along to help out with a second scope, which was greatly appreciated by the Ranger that organized the event. We were provided with accommodation in the shearer’s quarters at Kinchega for the night but we were intent on spending most of our time observing under the quite pristine conditions that we were presented with.
After we had setup Kev set the self timer on his camera and put it on a table to capture an image of our scopes on the helipad against an incredibly deep blue and cloudless sky as the sun set in the west.
All attending the observing session met at the National Parks Office at Kinchega and were led to the observing site in convoy by Ranger Jade. We initially had about 20 people, some from Broken Hill, some tourists that were passing through the region, some locals from Menindee and a work crew of about 10 turned up about 30 minutes late, they were involved in building a special fish passage so that fish could pass from below weir 32 in the Darling River to go upstream to spawn.
All up we had over 30 most interested observers lined up around our two scopes taking in the wonders of the night sky. It really was a stunning night incredibly still with the stars steady to virtually the horizon. Very early on we concentrated both scopes on Saturn, low in the west; the rings were very near edge on. It is great to listen to the almost involuntary exclamations when people have their first look through a telescope.
Following on from Saturn Kev and I toured the sky, each of us on different objects, providing a smorgasbord of different objects for the assembled people to observe. When dark adapted the star light illuminated the area around our scopes quite well. In answer to a question regarding the Moon, using two volunteers, I was able to demonstrate its synchronous rotation.
Joining the dots to make out the Butterfly was a great hit as was using my laser to outline the constellations. Omega Cent was a highlight as was the colour of the carbon star ESB 365. By 9pm Jupiter, although still quite low, looked good, this was an indication of just how good the seeing was.
All of our visitors had left by 10pm but Kev and I had set our sights on visually observing the “Bird Strike” on Jupiter. The GRS was extremely well defined, the seeing was rock solid. Kev had a 7mm Ortho in the 16 and I had a 6mm Ortho in the 12. The image scale in the 16 was larger but in both scopes the resolution was excellent. We both have Argo’s on our scopes and entertained ourselves with tours of various constellations, even came up with a PN I don’t recall seeing previously that looked just great, “The Little Gem” in Sagittarius.
By midnight the temp displayed by the Argo hit 3.7 degrees, “Birds Strike” had rotated into view, it looked almost 3D and clearly displayed a fan shape. As it came further into view the contrast between it and the Polar region was quite stark.
With young Christopher complaining about losing the feeling in his feet and with Kev and I most satisfied with our nights efforts, we packed up and made our way back to Kinchega to our quarters where each of us had a hot cup of soup before bunking down for what was left of the night.
There was not a cloud in the sky, not a breath of wind; the only movement was from a Roo slowly making his way through the sand hills that surrounded the dry lake bed immediately to the west of our observing site. NSW National Parks Service had asked me to run an observing night as part of their “Starry Starry Night Tours” in celebration of the IYA. These tours were scheduled to co-incide with the school holidays for 2009 and this was the second observing night at Kinchega in this series.
My son Christopher came along to help me and Kev came along to help out with a second scope, which was greatly appreciated by the Ranger that organized the event. We were provided with accommodation in the shearer’s quarters at Kinchega for the night but we were intent on spending most of our time observing under the quite pristine conditions that we were presented with.
After we had setup Kev set the self timer on his camera and put it on a table to capture an image of our scopes on the helipad against an incredibly deep blue and cloudless sky as the sun set in the west.
All attending the observing session met at the National Parks Office at Kinchega and were led to the observing site in convoy by Ranger Jade. We initially had about 20 people, some from Broken Hill, some tourists that were passing through the region, some locals from Menindee and a work crew of about 10 turned up about 30 minutes late, they were involved in building a special fish passage so that fish could pass from below weir 32 in the Darling River to go upstream to spawn.
All up we had over 30 most interested observers lined up around our two scopes taking in the wonders of the night sky. It really was a stunning night incredibly still with the stars steady to virtually the horizon. Very early on we concentrated both scopes on Saturn, low in the west; the rings were very near edge on. It is great to listen to the almost involuntary exclamations when people have their first look through a telescope.
Following on from Saturn Kev and I toured the sky, each of us on different objects, providing a smorgasbord of different objects for the assembled people to observe. When dark adapted the star light illuminated the area around our scopes quite well. In answer to a question regarding the Moon, using two volunteers, I was able to demonstrate its synchronous rotation.
Joining the dots to make out the Butterfly was a great hit as was using my laser to outline the constellations. Omega Cent was a highlight as was the colour of the carbon star ESB 365. By 9pm Jupiter, although still quite low, looked good, this was an indication of just how good the seeing was.
All of our visitors had left by 10pm but Kev and I had set our sights on visually observing the “Bird Strike” on Jupiter. The GRS was extremely well defined, the seeing was rock solid. Kev had a 7mm Ortho in the 16 and I had a 6mm Ortho in the 12. The image scale in the 16 was larger but in both scopes the resolution was excellent. We both have Argo’s on our scopes and entertained ourselves with tours of various constellations, even came up with a PN I don’t recall seeing previously that looked just great, “The Little Gem” in Sagittarius.
By midnight the temp displayed by the Argo hit 3.7 degrees, “Birds Strike” had rotated into view, it looked almost 3D and clearly displayed a fan shape. As it came further into view the contrast between it and the Polar region was quite stark.
With young Christopher complaining about losing the feeling in his feet and with Kev and I most satisfied with our nights efforts, we packed up and made our way back to Kinchega to our quarters where each of us had a hot cup of soup before bunking down for what was left of the night.