Fort Worth Astronomical Society (Est. 1949) - May 2010 : Astronomical League Member Society
Club Calendar – 2
Club Reports & Skyportunities – 3 Planetarium Software Reviews – 6
Thor’s Helmut – 6
SETI Pioneers – 8 STS-131 – 9 1 Stargazers’ Diary – 10 Awakening by Patrick McMahon
May 2010
Sunday Monday Tuesday Wednesday Thursday Friday Saturday
Mercury: Morning Star the last three weeks of the month, and is “easiest” to spot on the 25th 1 1 th Venus: Emerges as an Evening Object, low in the west at sunset. A crescent Moon is nearby on the 16 .
Mars: High in the south at sunset. Gibbous Mars is now half the angular size he was in February, and he continues to dim. The Moon passes by on the 19th. Jupiter: A Morning Star with a waning crescent Moon low on the 9th. Near the Pisces-Aquarius border. Saturn: Continues to be well-placed high in the southwest at sunset. North side of ring plane tilted 1.7O Uranus: Eastern morning sky in Pisces. Neptune: In the eastern morning sky near the Aquarius-Capricornus border. Pluto: Begins to cross Sagittarius Star Cloud (M24), which is “above” the teapot. May 6 – 24: rises 2am. The Eta-Aquarids continue from their April start and peak the morning of the 6th. Look for occasional smoke trails from these fast screachers which are the debris from Halley’s Comet.
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Moon at Apogee Third Qtr Moon
(251,180 miles) 11:15 pm
5:00 pm
Eta-Aquarids
peak
NASA announced
that Canada would build the shuttle robotic arm
Cinco de Mayo 35 years aog Space Day
9 10 11 12 13 14 15
New Moon 8:04 pm
3RF Star Party
Notable carbon star for May: SS Virginis
Challenge deep-sky object for May : 3C 273 (Virgo) New Moon New Moon Mother’s Day Weekend Weekend 16 17 18 19 20 21 22
First Qtr Moon
3RF Lunar Party
6:43 am
Moon at Perigee
Museum
(167,604 miles) Star Party Make use of the New 4 am
Moon Weekend for
better viewing at the
FWAS Dark Sky Site
Meeting
STS-101 Atlantis
New Moon launched
Weekend 10 years ago
23 24 25 26 27 28 29
Full Moon 6:07 pm
30 31 Top ten deep-sky objects for May: M3, M51, M63, M64, M83, M87, M104, M106, NGC 4449, NGC 4565
Top ten deep-sky binocular objects for May: M3, M51, M63, M64, M84, M86, M87, M104, M106, Mel 111
Memorial Day
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The Sky This Month – Thomsen Foundation -- 9 pm local time, May 15 (from Heavens-Above.com)
Star Charts: Sky & Telescope Sky Maps http://tinyrul.com/5np8n http://www.skymaps.com Heavens Above International Space Station Transits http://www.heavens-above.com http://tinyrul.com/y8zk5c
May Meeting Reports
President’s Report: Steve Tuttle reported that with April being an even month, there was no Executive Board meeting in April. Upcoming in June will the annual election for President, Vice-President, Secretary-Treasurer and for two of the four Directors seats on the Executive Committee. The Officers are for one-year terms, and the Directors seats are for two-year terms. The slate of candidates for nomination should be set for presentation at the May meeting so if you are interested in running, please send Steve or another Officer or Director your interest off-list. For a listing of duties, please consult the club’s Yahoo! pages in the
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Observing and Outreach Opportunities Weather permitting (FWAS contacts in parentheses)
May 1 - Government Canyon State Natural Area - Explore the Night Sky - Explore the night sky with the San Antonio Astronomical Association. View our Milky Way, Venus, Mars, Saturn, nebulae, star clusters and a few distant galaxies. You can also learn the basics of telescope operation. Open to ages 12 or older. Bring a telescope (or use one of the SAAA's), or binoculars, water, a snack if you like and a flashlight with a red lens cover. 8:30 PM-10:00 PM, please arrive by 7:45 PM; reservations required and will be accepted beginning April 1, 2010 and ending at noon April 30, 2010. For reservations and more information, e-mail [email protected] and include name, e-mail address and telephone number for each reservation. Program is subject to cancellation due to weather conditions, so check the Web site to confirm. (210) 688-9055, ext. 291. (Outside San Antonio) May 8 - Purtis Creek State Park - Stargazing & Take a Walk Through the Solar System - Take a walk through the solar system and view the night sky through a telescope. Then make your own star wheel and learn how to use it. Meet at the overflow camping parking lot. Accessible for the mobility impaired. 7:30 p.m. (903) 425-2332. May 8 - Dinosaur Valley State Park — Stargazing — Meet Dr. Ray Benge, Associate Professor at Tarrant County College and occasional speaker at our FWAS meetings, who will give a presentation. Then you can view the starry skies through telescopes. Telescopes will be provided or bring your own. Some binoculars are available to be checked out or bring your own. 8-9 PM. Call to confirm and for more information, (254) 897-4588. May 15 (DSO) & 22 (Lunar) - Three Rivers Foundation (“3RF”) - 3RF invites you out to Comanche Springs near Crowell, Texas for a night under the stars. The dark skies of Big Ranch Country provide a spectacular view of the universe. The party starts with solar observing followed by a break. Evening activities begin with a short educational introduction to astronomy. The observatories and Star Field are then opened to the public to enjoy the use of many different kinds of astronomy instruments. For more information the day of a scheduled star party, please call 940-655-3384. (Russ Boatright and Doug Brown) (Panhandle Plains, where Oklahoma tucks into the Texas Panhandle) May 22 – FWAS & Noble Planetarium Star Party – Come one; come all to the star party at the Fort Worth Museum of Science and History. These star parties provide a great opportunity to bring your children and give them a chance to look though a number of different telescopes. And for new members it is a good time to see a number of different telescopes and talk to other club members about them. And of course, we need members with telescopes and binoculars that enjoy sharing the sky with Museum guests. We meet in the parking lot to the south of the museum on the corner of Montgomery and Harley. Time: dusk (sunset is about 7:40 so give yourself some time to set up) until 10:30. Michele will bring brownies and Linda will provide drinks. (Linda Krouse & Michele Martinez)
Lunation 1081 at Age: 9 Days, 2 hours, 56 minutes *and everyone knows that the Moon is made out of green cheese.” Plato Crater Vallis Alps The picture to the left almost shows what the Moon will look like Mons Piton O at 11:52 pm on the night of our May 22, 2010 Museum star party.
This image does not exactly represent what will be visible along the limbs, because on that night the libration of the Moon will be almost lunar NNE. The Moon’s North Pole will appear to be tilted Eratosthenes Crater more towards us. The northern limb will be most exposed by 6.7O Copernicus Crater on the 24th. At Moonrise, the Moon’s SW will be “down.”
Let’s look at a few of the terminator targets. Travel from Plato to the Vallis Alps and below their arc find Mons Piton and notice that the light/shadow is opposite from the surrounding craters and mountains. That is because it is a mound; as opposed to an
O Gould & Wolf Craters (ghost craters) Almond Joy. Look to the northeast of Bullialdus Crater (It would Bullialdus Crater be Bullialdus’ label’s apostrophe; I couldn’t get an arrow to work right). Here you will find the flooded remnants of the craters Gould (find the crater rims) and Wolf (a totally lava-flooded crater), you’ll need a 6 to 12 inch scope to resolve them. Farther south along the terminator towards the South Pole is Clavius Tyco Crater Crater, and you’ll want to see Tom Koonce’s article on it in the Longomontarus Crater February 2009 Prime Focus. Another point of interest is the Clavius Crater faint crater Fra Mauro to the south of Copernicus. Apollo 14 (Feb. 2009 Prime Focus) landed just north of this crater on January 31st, 1971.
Background image was borrowed from http://www.pa.msu.edu/people/frenchj/moon/moon-9day-1869.jpg
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Star Party Reports
Museum & FWAS Star Party: We had an absolutely beautiful evening for star gazing at the Museum of Science and History April 24th. After so many cloudy nights, the wind died down and the stars were bright and clear. We had a wonderful crowd, I estimate about 300 people came out. Neil Wallace was teaching the kids about binary stars. I really enjoy walking around and listening in on the different discussions, I learn a lot that way. Danny Arthur had an awesome high powered view of Saturn and the moon. And LaVerne Biser was back again with his cool wooden scope. I handed out a number of brochures so perhaps we will have some new members soon. The only disaster of the evening was the failed brownies, my apologies to all the kids who look forward to them. The oven will be repaired by next month. Linda and I would like to express our thanks to Museum everyone for volunteering at the April Star Party were: Museum LaVerne Biser, Matt McCullar, Rick Ruiz, Bruce Campbell, Dennis Spears, Neil Wallace, Shawn Kirchdorfer, Sam Stewart, Dave Stewart, Joe Bennett, Patrick McMahon, Barry Allen, Russ Boatright, Doug Brown, and Mike Ahner. And at the March Star Party there were: LaVerne Biser, Norm Robinson, Patrick McMahon, Irving Mike Ahner, Joseph Bennett, Bob Wilbers, Inayat Lalani, Neil Wallace, Dean Crabtree, Danny Arthur, Ben Hudgens, Matt Reed, Rick Ruiz, Shawn Kirchdorfer, Matt McCullar, Russ Boatright, Doug Brown, Juan Martinez, Scott McDonald, Jimmy Banks, and Don Garland -- Michele Martinez
In April, the club was also represented at the City of Irving Earth Day event, as well as in Irving BSA Bridgeport at a BSA Jamboree.
Mid - South Star Gaze I’m back from a week at the Mid-South Star Gaze held at French Camp, Ms. This year was the 25th anniversary of Rainwater Observatory at French Camp. I took several images of the Moon-Venus-Mercury grouping and this was the best on 4-15 shortly after sunset. Canon XSi, 2 sec. f/8 ISO 1600. Mercury is playing hide and seek in the tree branches. We had about 100 registered for the gaze and there was pretty good weather for most of the week. Thursday night was one of the best observing nights I can recall in recent years at French Camp. It was a dark sky of 7.1 mag. according to the Sky Quality Meter I recently purchased and excellent seeing. Lots of imaging gear was present among observers along with all kinds of scopes including the 32" Tectron Dobsonian. Mid-South – Ben Hudgens (image is best viewed in your browser window rather than in print – ed.) 5
Free Planetarium Software Reviewed at the April Meeting
At the April Meeting, Steve Tuttle gave a presentation on the two planetarium software packages that he uses which also happen to be available for free on the Internet. Astronomy software can be for planetariums; as an observing tool for telescope and optics design; for telescope control; and for astrophotography. In his talk, Steve reviewed the planetarium software available from Cartus du Ciel and also from Stellarium. You will want a software packet to accurately display sky maps and to do so forward and backward in time, while providing basic information about the displayed objects. You would also want the software to locate objects either by name or coordinates and to render images of the most well-known targets. Bonus functions of planetarium software might be to control your telescope, to virtually locate the user away from Earth, and produce printable sky charts. Software that can perform on a wide variety of OS platforms is a plus. Steve demonstrated the functionality of the two selected softwares. Common features are: accurate placement of objects with respect to time and observer location; information on the selected object; object lookup; ability to scroll through the sky; set the date and time forward or backward many centuries; night mode for screen display; Milky Way position in the sky; set the level of objects to display; toggle to show or not show equatorial or azimuthal grids; and select colors for such things as the grids, constellation lines, names, deep sky object markers, etc. The strengths of the Cartes du Ciel are 8-V color rendering of stars; add or modify object data catalogues; printable sky charts; use different colors and shapes for different types of DSOs; control ASCOM compliant GOTO scopes; can use photos from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey; and it is fully checked out on Windows XP & Vista, Mac OSX 10.4+ (Intel processors), and several versions of UNIX. The strengths of the Stellarium package are that it gives realistic visual renderings; allows for scripting language; user plug-in tools can be used in C Language; selection of sky cultures; photos of many DSOs; and is fully checked out on Windows XP and higher, Mac OSX 10+, and several versions UNIX. A question and answer period followed the presentation.
NGC2359 – Thor’s Helmet by Steve Tuttle
It seems forever since I have been out with my scope and camera. Over spring break I had the opportunity and selected NGC2359, Thor’s Helmet, as my target. In Canis Major, this nebula is a great example of “bubble” type nebula. These nebula are found surrounding very massive, hot, young (but near supernova stage) stars. The shock wave of the star’s solar wind not only creates the bubble, but is interacting with a molecular cloud (the dark opaque material) near the nebula. These types of stars are known as Wolf-Rayet stars. Named for their discoverers, they are nearly at the end of their lives. Elements like Carbon and Oxygen (generated by the thermonuclear interior) begin to escape the interior. This leads to the strong solar winds. The nebula’s full extent is about 30ly across and it is estimated to be about 15kly away. Other well known nebulae surrounding Wolf-Rayet stars include NGC6888, the Crescent Nebula and NGC7635, the Bubble Nebula. My photo was taken using narrowband filters for the primary wavelengths of Hydrogen-alpha, Oxygen-III and Sulfur-II. The colors were mapped in the standard Hubble palette (SII-Red, Ha-Green and OIII-Blue). You can find an unmodified version of my photo, at: http://www.stuttle1.com/obj_ingc2359.html
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Coma Berenices
The constellation Coma Berenices refers to a classical story concerning the hair of Berenice, the wife of Ptolemy III of Egypt. While the story is an old one, the constellation is relatively new, being introduced by Tycho Brahe (1546-1601). According to the story, Ptolemy had waged a long war on the Assyrians, since it was they who had killed his sister. As Ptolemy returned successfully from the war, his wife Berenice had her beautiful tresses ceremoniously clipped and given to Aphrodite, laid out on the temple altar. As the evening's festivities continued, the shorn hair was discovered to be missing. The priests might be sacrificed, if the queen's hair couldn't be found. It was the astronomer Conon of Samos who came to their rescue by proclaiming that Aphrodite had accepted the gift of Berenice's hair, which now shown brightly in the heavens next to Leo.
The constellation of Coma Berenices is centered between Bootes, Leo, Canes Venatici and Virgo. There are no bright stars in this constellation and in light polluted areas it is almost impossible to locate the constellation with the naked eye. It’ three brightest stars, 42-Alpha (mag.4.3), 43-Beta (mag.4.2) and 15-Gamma (mag.4.3) are barely visible. The constellation contains a globular cluster (M53) and of course there is the large group of galaxies near the southern border, a part of the coma-virgo supercluster. There are eight Messier objects (M53, M64, M85, M88, M91, M98, M99, and M100), as well as a number of other fine galaxies, with the stunning edge-on Needle Galaxy (NGC 4565) being the best of the bunch. However the best object is the open cluster known as The Coma Star Cluster. The Coma Berenices Star Cluster is a large open cluster, covering an area of 5 degrees. In 1938 R.J. Trumpler proved that the Coma star cluster is a true physical cluster. He identified 37 stars as cluster members. It is situated in the north-western part of the constellation Coma Berenices, just a few degrees from the Northern Galactic Pole. This is a peculiar location, because the majority of open clusters can be found in the Milky Way. At a distance of 250 light years, the Coma star cluster is one of the nearest of all the open star clusters. Only the Ursa Major Moving group and the Hyades lie closer to our solar system. Its total mass is about 100 times that of our sun. It contains no giant stars. The Coma star cluster can be spotted using binoculars, and is best viewed with a 7x50 or 8x56. It is futile to try to observe it in your scope, even with your lowest power eyepiece you won’t encompass the entire cluster. Moving in a straight line from Denebola (94 Beta-Leonis) to Alkaid (85-Eta Ursae Majoris) you will find the star cluster on one third of this imaginary line, starting from Denebola. It is best observed during the spring.
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Cloudy Night Library Media reviews by Matt J. McCullar, FWAS
SETI Pioneers by David W. Swift Published in 1991 by The University of Arizona Press 434 pages ISBN 0-8165-1408-9 This title is currently available in the monthly club raffle.
What kind of person decides to spend a career working on the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence (SETI)? And why would they? There aren’t that many scientists looking for it, compared to astronomers as a whole. At this point, SETI is still mostly just theory and the actual search is dull, unrewarding, continuous failure. Still, everything must start somewhere. SETI Pioneers is a collection of interviews between the author and 16 scientists involved in SETI, from all over the world. Some of the names you’ll probably recognize (such as the late Carl Sagan). Each scientist was asked pretty much the same set of questions, but the answers ranged all over the spectrum. “What was your childhood like? How did you get into SETI? When do you think ‘First Contact’ will occur? What is the first thing you would do upon hearing a SETI signal? What would these beings look like? What impact do you think such a discovery will have on Earth?” The author writes, “Are we alone in the universe, or are other beings out there, somewhere among the stars? This is a fundamental question, with implications for a vast array of human concerns. Science, religion, politics, philosophy – few topics would not be affected by the answer. It touches such basic issues as the nature of life and our place in the cosmos. Are we unique?” Most of those interviewed agree that SETI is not something upon which many scientists want to risk an entire career. Funding is a constant problem, and there is no promise of positive results. For many of these scientists, SETI is only a part-time interest. A few excerpts: Frank Drake: “What should be done when we eventually receive evidence of ETI? In almost any scenario you’ll have to release the news soon because it will get out one way or another. That’s because none of the radio observatories have any security setup or any way to inhibit the news from getting out. It would leak. “The long-term effect is going to be enormous, more than anyone can imagine.” Bernard Oliver: “The question is really, ‘Is intelligent life a negligible and extremely rare phenomenon in the universe, or is it so prevalent that the universe can be considered to be somewhat efficient in producing it?’ “I think that legislators and others underestimate the public’s support for SETI because of a fear of ridicule. I think that politicians are afraid to take a position which is (a) unconventional, and (b) cannot be proved to be right. “When do I think contact with ETI will be made? Well, that’s so dependent on funding. I don’t expect to make contact with any of the things we’re doing now. I think that what we’re going through is a dress rehearsal, learning how to parse these signals apart and look for the things that might be there. “There are some people who fear that if we respond, we will be visited in a hostile way by extraterrestrials. I don’t share that fear at all because I am acutely aware of the costs of interstellar travel. It’s so expensive that I think it’s an economic impossibility.” Ronald Bracewell: “I suspect that the discovery of ETI would be a nine-day wonder in the press. The news that some extraterrestrial message had been intercepted would be very exciting, but only for a few days, because it wouldn’t continue to produce day-by-day developments. “I don’t believe that we would find any spaceship that had taken the trouble to come all this way and was not armed. It doesn’t make sense.” John Billingham: “We think the worst possible thing that anybody could do, would be to announce that they have discovered another civilization, only to find out that some college students have pulled off a magnificent prank. “Any civilization we detect must be older than ourselves. It is likely to be very much older. That knowledge in itself would be tremendously useful to the way in which we think here, about our own future. The reason is that it tells us it is possible to survive as an intelligent species over very long periods of time. “It’s conceivable that if we detect a signal from somewhere else, it could be a signal being transmitted by an intelligent machine. The machine might have been left there in situ, with the job of transmitting and sending out its message when its biological predecessors have left for some reason, or even become extinct.” Each scientist interviewed for this book had a laid-back, matter-of-fact attitude. It was as if we were talking with each one over a cup of coffee after an astronomy club meeting. It does take a while to go through SETI Pioneers completely (over 400 pages!), but it reads rather quickly. (I would have enjoyed more illustrations or photographs.) Even though this book is almost 20 years old, it still provides much food for thought. Next time you look through your telescope, ask yourself: “Is someone out there looking at me?”
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STS-131 Discovery Launch by Rick Ruiz
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Stargazers’ Diary – Russ Boatright and Doug Brown
April 10, 2010 - Worth Scout Ranch Palo Pinto, Texas - clear skies, windy
Astronomy volunteers were in great demand recently when two different scouting events were requesting telescopes on the same night. The bulk of FWAS had already committed to a scout outing in Bridgeport, when a church friend of Dave Titus asked him if he could help with a similar event near Palo Pinto. Dave got commitments from us and Tom Monahan, and we managed to also snare James Addison from the Lipan group to help out. Hopefully, the five of us could handle a scout group that would probably top one hundred. We've had lots of experience doing star parties for groups too large while armed with too few telescopes and astronomers. They're seldom pleasant. Just recently, we had the pleasure of showing a few hundred Burleson school kids and their parents Saturn on behalf of 3RF. We only had two telescopes. You have to applaud the students for their patience, because the lines looked like the legendary ones from Soviet Russia that would form on the rumor of toilet paper availability and snake for miles. Yet, not a soul told us that it wasn't worth the wait after finally seeing the ringed planet, so we salute you, Burleson ISD. Fears such as these involving numbers and telescope capacity weren't far from our minds as we embarked on the journey to Palo Pinto. Another great aspect of this trip was the chance to once again travel one of our favorite roads in north Texas. Route 4 from Santo to Palo Pinto in western Palo Pinto County is one of the most scenic in the area, and the only somewhat mountainous route to be found among the flats of north Texas. It is reminiscent of the Arkansas Ozarks or Virginia's Skyline Drive, with its tight curves and scenic vistas, and offers a nice trip regardless of season. Now, spring was exploding into wildflowers and vegetation as we climbed the mountain roads to the scout camp along the Brazos River near twilight.. And the camp is a splendid dark site, in use since the 1930s. However, the light pollution threat came from the campus buildings all seemingly ablaze for some reason. Our old nemesis, high winds began to kick up once we were set up and locating targets.The smaller scopes would prevail under these conditions; rasseling with Mr. T in the wind is like busting a bronco. While we were waiting for the scouts, we took a look at M3, the globular cluster in Canes Venatici. We juiced the power for an awesome view that we could never hope to maintain in the wind for a viewing line, but it showed us the kind of darkness that the site could deliver. Despite the wind, the transparency was decent and galaxies showed well. All of the star party galaxy standards, including M81 & M82 in Ursa Major, The Leo Triplets M65 & M66 along with NGC 3628, M51 in Canes Venatici, and M104 the Sombrero Galaxy in Virgo, displayed detail and texture with low power despite tough conditions. And the Coma Star Cloud, Mellotte 111, rose in the east (away from the mess hall lights) as an easy naked eye wonder. This made us wonder how awesome this site could be on a great night. And its within an hour of Ft Worth. The biggest surprise of the evening was that our audience size was modest and our telescope numbers more than sufficed. It seems that the majority of scouts were just too worn out to spend much time with telescopes. As they made their way up towards the campsites from the evening's last event down by the river, many passed us by. Although it was only 10 o'clock, they'd probably been at it since dawn, and dawn tomorrow is set to come early. They were justifiably pooped. But we hope that the hardy ones that found the gas to spend some time with us found the visuals to be worth the lost shut eye.
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The Fine Print
FWAS Contact information for various observing certificates and you get the quarterly http://www.fortworthastro.com magazine, Reflector. League Observing clubs: http://tinyurl.com/3vjh4fl (Tres Ross, ALCor) Officers: Steve Tuttle – President Fort Worth Museum of Science & History See the Museum’s Lee Vinson – Vice President website for schedules: http://tinyurl.com/3jkn5j (Linda Krouse) Trista Oppermann – Interim Secretary - Treasurer Meetings – FWAS meets at 7:00 PM on the third Tuesday of the month at the UNT Health Science Center – Research & Education Building, Room 100; 3500 Camp Bowie Blvd; Ft. Worth. Guests and visitors are always welcome. (Steve Tuttle) Web Site – http://www.fortworthastro.com E-Group (members only) – You may post messages to the group by sending e-mail to [email protected]. Any message sent to [email protected] will be automatically sent to all members on the list. To subscribe, send a blank e-mail to [email protected] Include your real name. Outreach – items concerning FWAS Outreach activities should be addressed to [email protected] (Shawn Kirchdorfer) Prime Focus – The FWAS newsletter is published monthly. Letters to the editor, articles for publication, photos, or just about anything Observing Site Reminders you would like to have included in the newsletter should be sent Be careful with fire, ban in effect to: [email protected]. Mable Sterns Award Finalist, Steve Gray (2002) & Dean Crabtree (2008, 2009) Batting .273 All members … FWAS Annual Dues - $40 for adults / families, $20.00 for students Email John Dowell that you are going. (half-price Jan 1 thru June 30); checks payable to the Fort Worth Sign the logbook in the clubhouse Astronomical Society; payments can be mailed to 3812 Fenton Put equipment back neatly when finished Avenue. Fort Worth, TX 76133, or in-person at the next indoor Leave a log note if there is a club equipment problem; also, meeting. Membership runs July 1 through June 30. please contact a FWAS Trustee to let them know Discount Subscriptions Available – Sky & Telescope ($32.95), and Maintain Dark-Sky etiquette Astronomy (1 year for $34.00; 2 years for $60.00). A Sky & Turn out your headlights at the gate! Telescope subscription through FWAS entitles you to 10% off Last person out, please … purchases at Sky and Telescope’s on-line store. (Floyd May) Make sure nothing is left out Astronomical League Membership – Your FWAS membership also Lock the gate. enrolls you in the Astronomical League. This makes you eligible
Credits Cover Image: Awakening Patrick McMahon Observing Data RCAS 2010 Observers’ Handbook Historical Data The Year in Space 2010 (Planetary Society) Sky Chart www.heavens-above.com Top Ten & Challenge Targets Dave Mitsky (Cloudy Nights Forums) Navigate the Newsletter When reading the electronic newsletter while on-line, if your cursor Museum Star Party pix “changes” as you roll over an image or blue text, you can click on that Mike Ahner web link to be taken to further information of the subject at hand. Irving Earth Day & BSA pix Shawn Kirchdorpher Moon-Venus-Mercury Ben Hudgens Coma Berenices verbiage backyard-astro.com Collins Atlas of the Night Sky scientific-web.com This artist rendering was chosen for a number of reasons: Why is Bootes looking away from his dogs & their prey the bears? Why were creepy looking sighthound whippet dogs chosen? Ewww. Does Berenice’s Hair look like a Portuguese-man-o-war to anyone else? (Or maybe her hair looks like a character on Aqua Teen Hunger Force.) For an informative look at the time-line associated with this constellation go to http://tinyurl.com/29g7vey A child educated only at school STS-131 down range & launch smoke trail pic Rick Ruiz is an uneducated child. Stonehenge Toon George Santayana Scott McCullar Thomsen Foundation pic Matt Reed
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