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Prime Focus (02-19).Pub Highlights of the February Sky - - - 1st - - - AM: Antares, Jupiter, Venus, a waning crescent Moon, and Saturn form a 35° arc stretching from southeast to the south-southeast. - - - 4th - - - New Moon 4:04 pm EST KAS - - - 10th - - - PM: Aer sunset, look halfway up in the south- General Meeting: Friday, February 1 @ 7:00 pm southwest to see a waxing crescent Moon hanging Kalamazoo Area Math & Science Center - See Page 12 for Details some 6° lower le of Mars. - - - 12 - - - Observing: Saturday, February 2 @ 7:00 pm First Quarter Moon 5:26 pm EST February Freeze Out - Kalamazoo Nature Center DUSK: Mercury reemerges from superior conjuncon - look toward the west- Board Meeting: Sunday, February 10 @ 5:00 pm southwest aer sunset. Sunnyside Church - 2800 Gull Road - All Members Welcome - - - 13th - - - PM: The Moon is in the Hyades, 2° from Aldebaran. - - - 17th 19th - - - Inside the Newsletter. AM: Venus and Saturn are 1° apart. Look toward the southeast before sunrise. January Meeng Minutes.................. p. 2 Board Meeng Minutes..................... p. 2 - - - 17 - - - PM: A waxing gibbous Recent Addion to KAS Library.......... p. 3 Moon is in Cancer, next to Observaons...................................... p. 3 M44, the Beehive Cluster. Community Outreach in 2019............p. 4 - - - 26 - - - KAS Member Lunar Eclipse Images.... p. 5 Last Quarter Moon 6:28 am EST Tele Vue 32mm Plössl........................ p. 7 NASA Night Sky Notes........................ p. 8 - - - 27th - - - DAWN: A waning crescent Star Pares in 2019............................ p. 9 Moon is 2° to the upper February Night Sky............................. p. 10 right of Jupiter. KAS Board & Announcements............ p. 11 - - - 27th - - - DAWN: The Moon is about General Meeng Preview.................. p. 12 halfway between Jupiter and Saturn. The general meeting of the Kalamazoo Astronomical Society The Kalamazoo Astronomical Society Board met on January was brought to order by President Richard Bell on Friday, 13, 2019 at Sunnyside Church. President Richard Bell called January 11, 2019 at 7:05 pm EDT. Approximately 36 the meeting to order at 5:15 pm. Board members present members and guests were in attendance at the Kalamazoo were Joe Comiskey, Jean DeMott, Scott Macfarlane, Jack Area Math & Science Center (KAMSC). Price, Don Stilwell, and Roger Williams. Richard began his President’s Report, as he often does, with A full Treasurer’s Report could not be presented as yet in the an update on the Remote Telescope. Much of what Richard absence of Rich Mather. Don had obtained a printout of all covered can be found in the Board Meeting Minutes to your the information available from Advia Credit Union, but more right. Another outreach activity, Science Night at Vicksburg details were needed from Rich to generate a full report. Don Middle School on March 13th, was announced. A list of all and Jack agreed to meet with Rich and to get the data re- our community outreach events to date is on page 4. quired for a full report, which was overdue. Don had con- Richard then discussed our next fund raiser, which officially firmed with Rich that Michigan Form 990 had been submit- begins in mid-February. This effort will see a serious ted with payment to maintain our tax exempt status. upgrade to Owl Observatory. Even though the fund raiser hasn’t started yet, we have already raised significant funds. Regarding the February meeting, Richard had previously About $6,200 was raised in Eclipse Shades sales in 2017. suggested a NOVA program on Pluto and Ultima Thule, but Richard also announced that an anonymous KAS member now he suggested a program that he had done previously on has donated $5,000 toward the upgrade! We hope to raise extrasolar planets. The Board felt that this would be a prefer- $35,000 for the first phase of the project. able alternative. Richard reported a major problem in setting up meeting programs, with an unprecedentedly low response Our feature presentation was the second-ever Astronomy rate from potential speakers whom he had tried to contact. Open House. Three KAS members were invited to give 10 - Further possibilities were suggested, and Richard said that he 15 minute TED-style presentations. Richard began with an would continue to work on this. overview of Hubble’s Law, which says that a galaxy’s distance is directly proportional to its redshift (or recession In the follow-up category, Richard reported that the Remote velocity). A more distant galaxy recedes away from us faster Telescope Project was awaiting help on the problem of run- than a nearby galaxy. This is caused by the expansion of ning MaxIm DL under control of ACP Observatory Control space and was a significant pre-cursor to the Big Bang Software. He was trying to contact Bob Denny, the creator Theory. Joe Comiskey’s presentation was entitled Does of ACP. Richard also reported that the Owl Observatory Anybody Really Know What Time it Is? and dealt with Upgrade, while barely underway, had already received a sidereal time, which is time determined from the motion of a number of donations. He asked whether or not a keypad planet relative to the stars. This relates directly to the should be obtained for the Astro-Physics mount, but that the celestial coordinate system (Right Ascension and mount should only be run under computer control. He also declination), which was also covered. Mark Miller then mentioned that we need to update the license for the Soft- discussed Two New Planets for the New Year. First was New ware Bisque program TheSky. After a motion by Joe and Horizons’ encounter with Ultima Thule (officially 2014 second by Jean, the Board voted unanimously to make the MU69) on January 1st. Ultima Thule was revealed to be a purchase. contact binary object. Only modest resolution images have been returned thus far. Sharper views are coming, but it will The next follow-up item concerned what should be done be 20 months before all the data is downloaded from the with the donated telescopes still being held by the club, some spacecraft! Mark then reported on NASA’s OSIRIS-Rex of which are not being borrowed or are not in working order. mission to asteroid 101955 Bennu. OSIRIS arrived at Bennu After some discussion, it was decided that Jack would make on December 3rd and went into orbit on December 31st. Mark a current inventory of the instruments, after which the Board concluded by showing how samples will be collected in 2020 would decide what should be kept for loaners and what and returned to Earth in 2023. should be sold. Jean cautioned that we should be sure to clean up and test them as necessary before offering any for Several members shared observing reports after the snack sale. break. Bob & Barb Havira recently traveled to Iceland, but did not see any aurora. Joe Comiskey observed Comet 46P/ The final item in this category was a recap of a few of the Wirtanen. It was bright (for a comet), but not overly planned outreach activities. These included Science Night at impressive. In astronomical news, China’s Chang’e 4 landed Vicksburg Middle School on March 13th and Ransom Dis- on the farside of the Moon on January 3rd. Jack Price trict Library on June 24th from 2 - 4 pm. Richard reminded mentioned the 2019 dates for the Great Lakes Star Gaze (see everyone about how crowded the outreach schedule is and page 9 for this and many other star party dates). The about the number of members we need to carry out the pro- meeting concluded at 9:17 pm. gram. Prime Focus Page 2 February 2019 In new business, the KAS had received an invitation to at- tend the Irving S. Gilmore Foundation grantee gathering on February 7th, and Jack volunteered to attend representing the KAS. Richard alerted the Board to the need for year 2019 Public Observing Session brochures. The consensus was that 1,500 should be ordered. Action was deferred until Don could check prices with an alternative supplier. Jack and Joe gave a brief report on their recent appearance at the Air Zoo, which had gone quite well. In a final item, Jean noted that The Lunar Eclipse Watch scheduled for January 20th at the Mike Sinclair had been spending much time watching the Nature Center turned out to be a successful failure. Dutton Street doors of KAMSC on general meeting nights. Amazingly, for January, skies were crystal clear, but we had She suggested that we organize a schedule that would take to cancel due to brutally low temperatures. During the the pressure off Mike. eclipse, the temperature ranged from 1° F to -3° F with a windchill around -11° F. My plan was to turn Owl With the conclusion of business, the meeting was adjourned Observatory into a warm room, but the fresh snowfall the at 6:56 pm. The next meeting was set for 5pm on February day before made access to the observatory problematic. 10th at Sunnyside. Fortunately, total lunar eclipses can be viewed safely with Respectfully submitted by Roger Williams unfiltered eyes, binoculars and telescopes so members and the public could observe the eclipse from home. It’s clear, from e-mail reports and member images beginning on page 5, that’s what many of you did. The Moon would be high enough above my tree line to image the entire eclipse from my backyard. So, I cleared out an area of my yard with a snow blower on Saturday and setup on Sunday, just in time New Addition to be interviewed by WWMT. This was preceded by an interview over the phone with WKZO on Monday. Always to the KAS Library good to get some publicity for the KAS! by Karen Woodworth, Ph.D.
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