Despite the poor weather our members were out in force observing the transit of Mercury across the face of the Sun, something that has to be done carefully to be safe.
There were 8 members and 4 visitors at the Observatory with a variety of 'scopes . Rita and Honor also had their PST's on hand. Other members observed at their homes or online.
[caption id="" align="aligncenter" width="800"] White light photo by Mike Rushton taken 14:50 on 11/11/19. C8 with f/6.3 focal reducer on HEQ5 Pro. Full aperture glass solar filter Canon 60D at prime focus ISO 1600, Exp 1/400 sec.[/caption]
It was horizon - horizon cloud last Wednesday for the sold out star gazing event at Hall Place, however we were prepared for this and along with comet making, we held sessions on drawing objects in the night sky and a variety of talks about astronomy. We had brilliant support from our members - thanks to all - who bought a variety of telescopes, cameras, meteorites and other displays, overall the visitors went away happy despite not being able to view the heavens.
In October 2019 we detected a total of 138 meteors associated with 29 different showers.
We observed 18 Orionids, which was the most active shower in October, the brightest being of visual magnitude -2.8, however sporadic meteors dominated our detections.
Overall we detected fewer meteors this year than in October 2018.
KELT-16b is an exo-planet in Cygnus, member Martin Crow measured the brightness of the parent star (KELT48) in order to capture the small drop in brightness when the planet transits the face of the star, this is a very subtle observation that requires a lot of attention to detail in order to capture such a small change in brightness.
Exo-Planet WASP 48b is a planet discovered around star WASB 48 in the constellation of Cygnus. Member, Martin Crow measured the brightness of WASP 48, using the same techniques used for variable star observations - although the changed in brightness are very small, in order to detect the drop in brightness of the star as the exo-planet transits across the face of the star.
HD 189733 b is an extrasolar planet, in the constellation of Vulpecula. According to Wikipedia it is 64.5 light years away. Member, Martin Crow, used the same techniques used for observing variable stars to detect the drop in light from the parent star as the planet crossed in front of it. If you have data you want to share please contact the webmaster.
As part of our public outreach, a few of us represented the Society at a "Fun Palace" event at Bexleyheath Library on Saturday. These relatively low-key events are intended to showcase small, local interest groups such as arts & crafts, therapies, lizard / snake keeping and in our case, all things Astronomy!
We had a prominent and large display which meant good foot-fall and a lot of interest from the public. Former members from the 1960's and 1970's came by to say hello - these gents were quite elderly as you can appreciate but knew Dick Chambers, Dr Wilkins and John Wall.
Our telescope Olivia drew in visitors as did the planet game. It was encouraging to watch young children complete the planet game with little or no help. (Ask us about the 5-year-old and 3-year-olds completing it!)
We had Saturn sketched by one of the youngsters and also imaged a planet mounted at the far end of the Fiction section!
All in all, a very positive event - we received feedback from the Library team to say that we were a hit with their customers. Likely we will pick up some future visitors or even members, so watch this space.
I want to thank the team who helped on the day - Steve, Terry, Andy and Rita - really appreciate you giving up your time. We presented the Society in a very positive light.
A huge number of meteors were detected in August 2019. August continues to be a bumper month for Meteors, dominated by the Perseid's, but there are many other minor showers contributing to the number detected.
We also had our brightest meteor yet, a magnitude -5.5 sporadic meteor.
If you look at the surface plot (bottom Right) it looks like there were three independent peaks in August.
White light photo by Mike Rushton taken 14:50 on 11/11/19. C8 with f/6.3 focal reducer on HEQ5 Pro. Full aperture glass solar filter Canon 60D at prime focus ISO 1600, Exp 1/400 sec.[/caption]
Image by Janice McClean[/caption]
Image by Martin Crow 2019-11-11 14:53UT Ha Image[/caption]
Image by Honor Wheeler in White Light[/caption]
Image of the Transit of Mercury 11/11/2019 by Richard Bohner[/caption]
