22nd November 2007: Comet Holmes in Perseus
I am currently in Ecuador ´working´(!) - having a good time, more like - as a bird guide at a cloudforest lodge in the northwest of the country until 20th December. As you´d imagine a cloudforest isn´t conducive to much observing - I never thought I´d actually miss the UK´s crap skies! - apart from the odd glimpse of bits of the equatorial sky (we´re almost exactly on the Equator, well about 4 kilometres south of it to be precise) through sucker holes in the clouds. But the other night it was clear(ish) and I managed to see, and sketch, the comet - Comet Holmes - that is currently spectacularly occupying space in Perseus.
I did make a sketch and notes, but there´s no way I can scan and upload them until I get home just before Christmas. The comet is bright, round and with a brighter core and is obvious with the unaided eye.
Over the past 10 years, we´ve done well with bright comets from Hyakutake, through Hale-Bopp and now Holmes.
Sketch and notes to follow
10th September:
A good forecast for once. Let’s hope the reality lives up to the forecast for once. Who knows, I might get that Double Cluster sketch finished, or that naked eye Milky Way one I began way back last year.
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Well I didn’t get either sketch finished but did spend an enjoyable half hour or so renewing friendships with some of the brighter deep sky objects, with the help of my littlest scope, Tiny. It was surprising exactly what is visible with such a small aperture, even under less-than-pristine UK skies and I look forward to using it under really dark skies in Ecuador, TSP 2008 (if I can get there next year) and in Australia (I plan to go there again in 2009 if I can).
Made a sketch of M22. It was painful to have to leave decent observing conditions at half-past-nine but common sense dictated that, as I had to get up at stupid o’clock (0600) to go to work, I had to get to bed. Having to get up that early should be banned as it infringes astronomers’ human rights!
8th September:
Managed to get a little observing in for half an hour before the inevitable clouds and mist rolled in. That tiny white travel scope really is a super little thing. I’ve been getting good rich field views of the Milky Way and the Double Cluster and the sharpness is outstanding.
The North America Nebula (NGC 7000) in Cygnus was very prominent this evening, both naked eye and through binoculars. Pity the clouds had to move in and be a pain in the arse, cutting short my Double Cluster sketch.
There was musical accompaniment and extra light pollution courtesy of the nearby Bestival music festival, so I went and got my headphones and listened to less lame stuff, namely Rammstein.
30th August:
Initially I wasn’t going to bother with the scope as the Moon is still so bright but as I could see a few open clusters with my binoculars - e.g. Stock 23, NGC 1027 - so I brought the scope out and set it up. Sketched Stock 23 but gave up afterwards due to the rising moon (96% illuminated) making observing (locating objects) an annoying and frustrating undertaking.
Stock 23 is a small, sparse cluster with 4 bright members in a kite shape. Visible in 8×42 binoculars and just about resolvable (4 main stars) with averted vision through the binocs.
Typically, now the moon is going down, the weather is deteriorating again. I’m hoping that September will have better conditions than August has had.
25th-26th August:
It was much clearer last night than the night before. There was still a bit of haze in the sky but not too much, so the effect of the nearly full Moon was not as bad.
I have got a new red-dot finder so I taped that to the refractor and that worked surprisingly well. It was easy to locate objects using just that, although £20 for it was a bit steep (and that was a discount!).
Because of the Moon and awkwardness of using the refractor in a straight through configuration, I didn’t do much sketching, just M82 (for a bit of practice) and Trumpler 2 in Perseus.
Trumpler 2 was surprisingly easy to find and is visible in binoculars as a hazy, elongated patch at RA 02 37 18, Dec +55 59 00 north west of the Double Cluster. In the scope, at 21x, I could see it as a sparse open cluster strung out across the eyepiece, orientated north to south. The stars were all the same colour, apart from an orange one in the middle of the string, but the brightnesses all varied, with a few fainter members in among the bright ones.
24th August:
I have managed to do a little observing after heaven knows how long. Ok, the conditions left a lot to be desired with a three quarter Moon and an incredibly milky sky (the usually bright Milky Way was all but invisible) so serious deep sky observing was a no-no but I did look at lollipops M31, Albireo (my favourite double) and the Alcor/Mizar double in Ursa Major, using my old, but good 4″ refractor. No matter, the stars were at least visible and after this horrible summer we’ve had, with seemingly endless cloud cover that’s something of an achievement and, despite the far-from-ideal observing conditions it was a very enjoyable hour or so.
I actually did some drawings of the doubles which I’ll scan, tart up a bit in Photoshop, and post sometime tomorrow.
Using the refractor was a little awkward as the 45 degree prism is at Richard’s with the 3 inch, so I was having to bend double and perform the sort of contortions normally only seen in a circus to aim it and look through it.