Sunsets, Stars, West, Wind
Mega coolness!
Never before have astronomers been able to see individual stars inside an external spiral galaxy over such a large contiguous area.
Hubble’s high-definition panoramic view of the Andromeda Galaxy | Astronomy.com.
Despite a busy weekend of van maintenance (oil change/tire rotation), hair maintenance (shampoo, cut & style), yard maintenance (leaves, leaves and more leaves and now pine needles), home improvement projects (refinishing lower kitchen cabinets) and exercise (very long walk with Apollo), I squeezed in an hour of star gazing after a night out with Terry and friends at Jack Stack on the Plaza. I’ve been wanting to get the scope out for a couple of weeks now, but the evening skies have not cooperated, remaining hazy at best or completely cloud covered at their worst. Upon parking the car in the driveway Saturday night, I looked up and decided the skies looked good enough to attempt some star gazing. I didn’t even take my purse into the house. I drug the telescope out of the garage and began hunting down more targets on my Astro Quest observing award checklist.
I did make one trip inside to retrieve my binoculars, pocket star atlas, clipboard and checklist. I used Jupiter to re-align the finderscope and spent several minutes enjoying an interesting moon alignment (see image above).
Using binoculars, I easily found the Andromeda galaxy and the Double Cluster (between Perseus and Cassiopeia). I checked off two stars from my list, Algol in Perseus and Gamma Cassiopeiae. Since the constellation Pegasus was nearly directly overhead, I went hunting for the Triangulum galaxy, also known as M33. I could barely see the three stars in the constellation Triangulum, but no matter how hard I searched (with binoculars, not naked eye), I could not find this galaxy. I should have been able to trace a line from M31 through two stars in the constellation Andremeda (Mu and Beta Andromedae) to find M33, but I was defeated once again by urban (and prison) light pollution. I had hoped to stumble upon it with binoculars, especially since M31 was so easily visible and found (almost naked eye Saturday night, but not quite).
I became more chilled as the evening wore on, neglecting to put on my sweater and just ignoring the 40 degree temperatures. The lack of wind helped shore up my illusion of warmth. I thought I’d try one last object before packing the scope up and returning it to the garage. I went hunting for the Garnet star in the constellation Cepheus. With my naked eyes, I could barely make out some of the stars that form the ‘house’ asterism. I knew the general area to look for Mu Cephei so I aimed my binoculars between the alpha and delta stars. Whoa! Way, way too many stars visible, thanks to the backdrop of our own Milky Way galaxy. Staring again with just my eyes, I squinted against the light pollution, but could still only see some of the anchor stars of Cepheus and no Milky Way stars.
I gave up, because I knew I would need to study several star atlases closely and device a star hop from Alpha Cephei to Mu Cephei, a trail I would need to memorize, so I wouldn’t have to take my reading glasses on and off while attempting to observe.
Another star trail I need to work on is finding M15 in the constellation Pegasus. I really shouldn’t have had any trouble finding M15, since you can draw a nearly strait line from Theta Pegasi through Epsilon Pegasi to point to that globular cluster. Either my skies were not dark enough, or I kept misidentifying Enif (Epsilon Pegasi) in my binoculars.
I couldn’t wait for midnight Friday night. The forecast for the weekend seemed unbelievable, especially after the scorching heat of the last month. Clear skies and mid to lower 80s for the high temperatures over the next several days. I came home from work to a grilled steak and baked potato dinner, prepared by Terry. Mmm-mmm good.
After dinner, Terry and I began reviewing the DVR play list and guide, deciding to delete many old recordings to free up some disc space. Our daughter called and chatted with us for about forty-five minutes. The conversation ended abruptly when her phone battery died.
For dessert, Terry blended a frozen raspberry lemonade. I read for a few minutes, while slowly sipping the drink (trying to avoid a brain freeze). I asked him to wake me up around midnight so I could scout the skies in search of the Andromeda galaxy and the planet Neptune. Apollo followed me upstairs to the bedroom to join me in my nap.
Terry woke me up just shortly after midnight. I rubbed the sleep out of my eyes and found my flip flops. I followed Terry back downstairs to the band room and walked out the patio door to the back yard. The skies were clear, if not what you’d call dark (why do my neighbors leave their porch lights on all night long?). I went back inside for one of my star charts and a pair of binoculars. I didn’t trust myself to lug the telescope outside in the dark, not being completely awake yet. A survey with the binoculars should be sufficient for my first attempt.
I walked out into my backyard, towards my one remaining pine tree and turned back around to face the east. What a difference a couple of hours makes! I could clearly see the Great Square of Pegasus hovering directly over my roof. In fact, my chimney seemed to be pointing a finger at the famous flying horse. I remembered what I’d read in the EarthSky post about finding the Andromeda galaxy and put what I’d learned to good use. With just a pair of mediocre binoculars, I easily found the smudge that is M31. Now I regretted not moving the XT8 outside before I took my nap.
I turned ninety degrees to the right and began scanning the southern skies. I can’t see most of the southern horizon, which is blocked by my neighbors tall trees and houses (and all the exterior lighting attached to them). I lose a good twenty if not thirty degrees of sky in all but one direction, to the southwest I can see a bit of horizon, but only through the even worse light pollution generated by the parking lot of a doctor’s office and the streetlights along Main Street (also known as K-7/US-73).
I needed to find the constellations Aquarius and Capricornus. The ecliptic passes through both of these constellations. Neptune swam the night skies somewhere between the two constellations on the invisible ecliptic course all the planets chart. The trouble in finding Neptune in this area of the sky comes from a lack of bright stars to anchor from for star hopping. I spent the next hour comparing the star atlas from my pocket guide to the stars I saw through the binoculars and eventually convinced myself I had found the southeastern tip of Capricornus. Just above those stars, I believe I found the two brightest stars in Aquarius, Sadalmelik and Sadalsuud, but those two stars were too high above the ecliptic and too far away in the field of view of the binoculars to find Neptune. I needed to do more research and next time use a telescope to help cut through the fog of light pollution.
After an hour, I returned inside and went back to bed, resolved to research better star charts in the morning.
I went back to Astronomy.com and re-read the article on Neptune, but I just couldn’t relate their star chart (shown above) to what I’d observed last night through the binoculars. I would need more magnification and a more steady mount to zoom in and match up the stars shown above to the field of view of the XT8.
I tried Sky and Telescope’s web page and found a better set of charts in a PDF format in their article about Uranus and Neptune visibility during 2012. I downloaded the document and will print it today to keep with the rest of my star charts.
Saturdays are always packed full of activities, so I’m hoping I’ll still have the energy tonight to make a second attempt at finding Neptune. My scouting trip showed me what I needed to overcome before I proceed with netting Neptune.