Hi all,
Just had this sent to me. On the night of the 24th February while many are viewing and imaging Comet Lulin you may also want to turn your attention and camera to this interesting event on Saturn. This is a rare event - even the Hubble Telescope will aimed at Saturn for this one. I am sure some of the fine imagers at IIS can post some images. http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2...pletransit.htm
PeterM
Grrr! Stellarium on my laptop and Stellarium on my desktop are giving me transit times that differ by an hour and I cannot see why. Doesn't matter. If the skies are clear, I'll just watch from about 9pm.
Here is the prediction for 18 min after midnight from Stellarium on my desktop, when all four Moons are over the surface for around 6 minutes!
(My laptop says this all happens one hour later. Yet both are set to the right location and both show the current time correctly )
The text says:- "The event begins on Tuesday morning, Feb. 24th at 10:54 UT when Titan's circular shadow falls across Saturn's cloudtops. About forty minutes later, the ruddy disk of Titan itself moves over the clouds."
Australian Eastern Summer time is UT + 11 hr, so shadow falls from 9:54pm Tuesday evening 24th Feb.
"At 14:24 UT, all four satellites and their shadows will simultaneously dot Saturn's disk" hence at AEST 1:24am Wed morning 25th Feb.
If the weather is good you may want to head up to Crackneck. I have done a good bit of planetary observation there over the years and the seeing is usually superb up there. Elevation is good and you are looking straight across the ocean. Water temperatures are generally very stable with no rising currents. If you want to make the trip up there, give me a call and I will probably join you.
)
