Messier – Crayford Manor House Astronomical Society Dartford

NEVER LOOK AT THE SUN DIRECTLY. Please click here for solar observing safely.

A superb selection of member images taken on Friday 3rd January 2025.

The Sun at midday taken by Dr Mike Rushton taken using a Dwarf II smart scope. 20 x 1/250 sec at Gain 0 with a ND6 solar filter.

The Sun taken by Honor Wheeler

The Sun taken by Jim Burchell

The Pleiades by Dr Mike Rushton using a Dwarf II smart scope. 200 x 10sec exposures at Gain 60.

Crescent Moon and Venus taken by Honor Wheeler. Venus is top right of the Moon.

Saturn, Venus and the Moon taken by Honor Wheeler. Venus is top right of the Moon and Saturn is near the top left corner of the image.

Thursday 2nd Jan 2025

[et_pb_section][et_pb_row][et_pb_column type="4_4"][et_pb_text]NEVER LOOK AT THE SUN DIRECTLY. Please click here for solar observing safely.

Thursday 2nd January 2025 was a good day & night for Astronomy. Clear views of the Sun during the day and a fantastic clear night. It was also an informal night too for the Society and as the sky was absolutely clear; without no hesitation members got out their telescopes and spent the evening observing the night sky. Below are some of the superb images members took that day and night.

The Sun with lots of sunspots taken by Honor Wheeler

Crescent Moon in the sunset taken by Honor Wheeler

Waxing Crescent Moon & Earthshine by taken Honor Wheeler. The moon was 2.62 days old and 8.35% illuminated.

Crescent Moon by taken by John Archer

Crescent Moon taken by Dr Mike Rushton using a Dwarf II smart scope. 1/30 sec x 20 at gain 0 and no filter.

The Moon & Venus by taken Honor Wheeler (Venus is in the top left corner)

Orion, Jupiter and Mars by taken Honor Wheeler. Mars is left of Orion and Jupiter is above Orion.

Members observing at the Pavilion on the 2nd Jan 2025 taken by Honor Wheeler

The Horsehead Nebula taken by Jim Burchell using a Seestar S50 smartscope. 205 stacked images and processed using the Seestar S50 processing software. The Horsehead Nebula (also known as Barnard 33 or B33) is a small dark nebula in the constellation Orion and is located just to the south of the star Alnitak, the eastern most star of Orion's Belt,

The Pleiades (also known as the Seven Sisters or Messier 45 is a young open star cluster in Taurus) taken by Diane Clarke taken using a Seestar S50 smartscope. 85 x 30sec exposures, Jpeg stacked using Seestar S50 internal software.

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Shears Green Junior School Cosmic Camp – 27th Sept 2024

On Friday 27th September 2024 several CMHASD members helped out at Shears Green Junior School Cosmic Camp.

Chairman John Archer wrote ''First of all I really want to thank all of the team who supported our evening of outreach last Friday 27th. Once again we attended Cosmic Camp at Shears Green Junior School and were greeted by an enthusiastic audience, most of whom managed to observe Saturn, as well as a number of deep sky objects. There were indoor activities run by Rita and Debra, and the pupils were treated to our slideshow of members’ aurora images. Outside there were a range of scopes – Dob’s, a refractor and also Smartscopes, ably demonstrated by our hardy team including Steve, Dave, Andy, Diane, Mike, Jim & co – thank you all so much for giving up your time and getting involved – it was a wonderful and eventually clear night''.

Below are 2 of the images taken by members whilst at the school that the children saw.

M31 by Dr Mike Rushton using a Dwarf II smartscope with no processing. Stacked image of 200 x 10s exposures at gain 80.

M31 is a barred spiral galaxy and is the nearest major galaxy to the Milky Way. It is also known as The Andromeda Galaxy, Messier 31 and NGC 224. The galaxy is approximately 765 kpc (2.5 million light-years) from Earth. The galaxy's name stems from the area of Earth's sky in which it appears, the constellation of Andromeda. Ref:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andromeda_Galaxy.

M27 by Diane Clarke (with the help of Jim Burchell) taken using a Seestar S50. Stacked image of 224 x 10s exposures. Processed using Affinity Photo.

M27 (also known as the Dumbbell Nebula, Apple Core Nebula, Messier 27, and NGC 6853) is a planetary nebula (nebulosity surrounding a white dwarf) in the constellation Vulpecula, at a distance of about 1360 light-years. It was the first such nebula to be discovered, by Charles Messier in 1764. Ref:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dumbbell_Nebula.

M31 by Kevin Langford – 19th August 2024

Messier 31 The Andromeda Galaxy (M31) taken by member Kevin Langford on the 19th August 2024 from Bexley. Kevin said ''This is just a 30mins of exposure as I was packing up for the night. I know it is very grainy, it needs a lot more time spent on it.'' Well we think it is rather superb as it is Kevin!

Kevin acquired his image using an ES102 with focus reducer and L-eNhance filter. Processed using Nina, Siril, and Affinity photo.

Latest images by member Terry Miles

Two super images by member Terry Miles taken using his Seestar S50 smart telescope on the 11th August 2024. The images are short exposures for deep-sky objects but you can clearly see the ring nebula in the 1st image and some nebulosity of the Eastern Veil Nebula in the 2nd image.

M57 The Ring Nebula. Also catalogued as NGC 6720 is a planetary nebula in the northern constellation of Lyra.

NGC 6992 The Eastern Veil Nebula. The Veil Nebula is a cloud of heated and ionized gas and dust in the constellation Cygnus.

Messier 31 & NGC 6888 by Jim Burchell

Two deep sky images by member Jim Burchell taken on the 4th May 2024 using a Seestar S50 smart scope.

NGC 6888 (Total of 28mins of exposure)

NGC 6888 (also known as the Crescent Nebula, Caldwell 27 and Sharpless 105) is an emission nebula in the constellation Cygnus. It was discovered by William Herschel in 1792 and is about 5000 light-years from Earth.

Messier M31 (Total of 11mins of exposure)

Messier 31 also known as M31 and NGC 224 is the Andromeda Galaxy. M31 is a barred spiral galaxy and is the nearest major galaxy to the Milky Way.

Messier 13 by Diane Clarke

A superb image of Messier 13 by member Diane Clarke taken on the 29th April 2024 using a Seestar S50 250mm, 120 x 10sec exp @ f5.

Messier 13 or M13 (also designated NGC 6205 and sometimes called the Great Globular Cluster in Hercules, the Hercules Globular Cluster, or the Great Hercules Cluster), is a globular cluster of several hundred thousand stars in the constellation of Hercules.

Diane wrote ''I captured this image of M13 the great Hercules cluster last night I was only able to get 20 minutes worth of data before the clouds arrived. M13 possibly contains 300,000 to over 500,000 stars with a distance of 25117.4 Ly. Below & to the right is HD 150679 a Spectral type A2 variable star distance approx. 425.24 Ly. Below & to the left is HD 150998 a Spectral type K2 variable star distance approx. 1164.84 Ly.''

Bode’s Galaxy (M81) & the Cigar Galaxy (M82) by Jim Burchell

A super image of Bode's Galaxy & the Cigar Galaxy in the constellation Ursa Major taken by member Jim Burchell on Wednesday 27th March 2024. Jim captured the image using a Seestar S50 smart telescope and stacking 60 x 10 second images.

Bode's Galaxy is towards the top of the image and the Cigar Galaxy is towards the bottom of Jim's image.

Bode’s Galaxy also known as Messier 81 (M81) is a grand design spiral galaxy which lies approximately 11.8 million light-years from Earth, with an apparent magnitude of 6.9.

The Cigar Galaxy which is also known as Messier 82 (M82) lies close to M81, and is often photographed together with Bode's Galaxy as Jim has done. M82 is called the 'Cigar Galaxy' because of the elongated elliptical shape produced by the tilt of its starry disk relative to our line of sight.

The Cigar Galaxy is a starburst galaxy approximately 12 million light-years away from Earth with an apparent magnitude of 8.4. The starburst activity is thought to have been triggered by interaction with the neighbouring Bode's Galaxy.

Both galaxies can be found about 10 degrees northwest of the star Dubhe in Ursa Major.

Messier 52 by Diane Clarke

A super image of Messier 52 or M52, also known as NGC 7654 taken by member Diane Clarke on the 6th March 2024 during a brief clear spell in the weather.

Messier 52 is also known as the Scorpion Cluster or the Salt & Pepper Cluster and it is an open cluster of stars in the constellation of Cassiopeia. The cluster has an apparent magnitude of 6.9 and lies at an approximate distance of 4,600 light years from Earth.

Diane acquired the image using a Seestar S50 smart scope, 270 x 10s subs, stacked & processed using Affinity Photo.

Visible at the bottom of the image is part of the Bubble Nebula also known as C11 and NGC7635.

The Whirlpool Galaxy (M51a) by Diane Clarke

A great image of the Whirlpool Galaxy, also known as Messier 51a (M51a) or NGC 5194 and its companion NGC 5195 taken by member Diane Clarke on the 3rd March 2024.

The Whirlpool Galaxy was the first galaxy to be classified as a spiral galaxy.

NGC 5195, which is also known as Messier 51b (M51b) is a dwarf galaxy and is the smaller object to the upper left to the Whirlpool galaxy in the image. NGC 5195 is gravitationally interacting with the Whirpool Galaxy. Both galaxies are found in the constellation Canes Venatici.

Diane acquired the image using a ZWO SeeStar S50 smart scope, taking 96 x 10sec subs and processed in Affinity photo.