Petavius

[bkm2304 (Richard Brown)]

Hi all,
I imaged Crater Petavius on 17/12/23. Petavius, named for the Jesuit Chronologist and theologian, Denis Petau. Petau had a massive output especially of theological works but also treatise on time.


Petavius is such a visually interesting Crater; The double "railway tracks" running along the western rim with the neat Petavius C interupting their extent.

The central moutains of Petavius are rather spread out and complex, rising to 2,500 metres. Rima Petavius 1 is the very straight looking candidate for an artificial canal like those we find on Mars.....

Nearby is Wrottesley named for British aristocrat and mathematician John Wrottesley. He was president of the British Association for the Advancement of Science in 1860, the year the Association hosted the infamous debate between Thomas Huxley the pro-Darwinian evolutionist affectionately known as Darwin's Bulldog, and Bishop "Soapy Sam" Wilberforce.

Most Bizarre is the Crater Adams named for, wait for it,

1. British Astronomer, John Couch Adams, the non-pushy calculator of the position of Neptune.

2. Walter Sydney Adams, American Spectroscopist.

3. Charles Hitchcock Adams, American Amateur Astronomer and father to landscape photographer, Ansell Adams.

Just why three great figures had to share a single, modestly sized crater is beyond me - it's not like there's a crater drought on the moon...

ZWO 178mm camera, Celestron 14"Edge HD. 2,000 frames stacked in Autostakkert!3 and sharpened in Registax.

[Saturnine (Jeff)]

Nice image Richard, love the perspective that gives the impression of hovering over the lunar landscape.
One of my favourite craters, remember imaging it in 2019 and first being aware of the traintracks, a very interesting feature.

[Dennis]

Very nicely captured and processed.

Thanks for the background material, little did those folks know what amateur astronomers would be producing a century or so after the naming of these features.

Dennis.

[Dave882 (David)]

Beautiful image. Love the subtle detail in the crater floor. Great processing too!!

[bkm2304 (Richard Brown)]

Thanks Dennis, Jeff and Dave. Every now and then the processing produces the “Apollo” palette - that asphalt grey you see in many Apollo shots and it lends the illusion of low orbit to the picture.
Richard

[Leo.G (Leo)]

Wow, you could almost see the foot prints with that, or the rover.
I need a bigger telescope and more muscles, your imaging through the 14" looks so much better than what I get through the 8", nearly twice as good/big.
Beautiful images!

[bkm2304 (Richard Brown)]

Originally Posted by Leo.G

Wow, you could almost see the foot prints with that, or the rover.
I need a bigger telescope and more muscles, your imaging through the 14" looks so much better than what I get through the 8", nearly twice as good/big.
Beautiful images!

Belated thanks, Leo. Yes, the bigger the better re: telescopes! Sadly the 14"only comes out rarely at the moment as we are living in a shed waiting for the house to be built.
Richard