Longmont Astronomical Society Februrary 2021

Pacman by Tally O’Donnell ?? Volume 36, No 2, Feb. 2021 ISSN 2641-8886 (web) ISSN 2641-8908 (print) LAS Meeting February 18 from 7 to 9 pm “A Walking Tour of Optical History - Artifacts and Anecdotes from the Astronomical Lyceum” by John W. Briggs Abstract: Pioneering telescope makers allowed a revolutionary ascendancy of American astronomy in the 19th and early 20th centuries. The Astronomical Lyceum in New Mexico, originally built in 1936 as a theater and gymnasium, now houses a collection of telescopes, optics, archives, and literature from this ascendancy. Its volunteer staff find the artifacts and associated history surpris- ingly engaging for visitors of all interest levels. The presentation will include unusual items, large and small, created by some of the America’s greatest early optical artists, including Henry and Harry Fitz, Alvan Clark and Sons, Carl and Robert Lundin, John A. Brashear, George Willis Ritchey, and the pioneer of astronomical spectroscopy and photography, Lewis Morris Rutherfurd. The collection includes artifacts originating right up through the Space Age, including from the amateur telescope making movement and its surprising influence. While time allows only an overview, the presentation hopes to remind participants how history of science and technology can be powerfully engaging and interesting for essentially anyone when offered in the right spirit.

John W. Briggs has lived and worked at far-ranging observatories in various technical capacities, including Mount Wilson, Yerkes, National Solar, Maria Mitchell, Venezuelan National, Chamberlin, and South Pole Station. He came to New Mexico with his family in 1997 to assist in the final commission- ing of the Sloan Digital Sky Survey. In the 1980s he was an assistant editor at Sky & Telescope magazine and built Bogsucker Observatory in Massachusetts. Photo of JWB at Chamberlin Ob- He is a member of many astronomical organizations including the Springfield servatory by Roger W. Sinnott circa Telescope Makers responsible for the annual Stellafane Convention in Ver- 1986. mont, and he has recently been elected to the board of the century-old Ameri- can Association of Variable Star Observers.

About LAS

The Longmont Astronomical Society Newsletter ISSN 2641-8886 (web) and ISSN 2641-8908 (print) is published monthly by the Longmont Astronomical Society, P. O. Box 806, Longmont, Colorado. Newsletter Editor is Vern Raben. Our website URL is https://www.longmontastro.org The Longmont Astronomical Society is a 501 c(3), non-profit corporation which was established in 1987. Our main goal is to promote local amateur astronomy. This is accomplished through regular month- ly meetings, star parties and public observing sessions. Regular meetings are held every month (except December) on the third Thursday. A broad spectrum of topics are covered at the meetings and include such things as deep sky observing, planetary imaging, narrow band imaging, equipment discussions and demonstrations just to name a few. These subjects are presented by both club members as well as special guests who are professional astronomers or experts in a particular field.

The Longmont Astronomical Society is affiliated with the Astronomical League (https://www.astroleague.org). The Astronomical League is an umbrella organization of amateur astronomy societies in the United States.

Page 2 Copyright (c) Longmont Astronomical Society, February 2021. Website: www.longmontastro.org Contents

Front Cover “Pacman” by Tally O’Donnell 2 LAS Virtual Meeting Februrary 18 from 7 to 9 pm “A Walking Tour of Optical History - Artifacts and Anecdotes from the Astronomical Lyceum” by John W Briggs 3 Contents 2021 LAS Officers and Board Members 4 Solar System Highlights for February by Vern Raben 5 “Have you ever seen or even heard of the largest open cluster Collinder 70?” by John Goss Newsletter Archives from February 1991, 2001, and 2011 6 “Navigating the February Night Sky” by John Goss 7 - 8 Comets for February - 156P (Russell/LINEAR) and C/2021 A2 (NEOWISE) 8 - 22 LAS Member Images from January 2020: 9 “NGC 2024 Flame Nebula” by Gary Garzone “M65” by Gary Garzone 10 “M66” by Gary Garzone “NGC 253” by Gary Garzone 11 “Flame and Alnitak” by Gary Garzone “Horsehead” by Gary Garzone 12 “M42” by Jim Pollock 13 “Jim Pollock’s Rig” 14 “Orion Nebula and Running Man” by Jim Pollock 15 “Rosette” by Jim Pollock 16 “Sombrero Galaxy” by Martin Butley “California Nebula without Stars” by Martin Butley 17 “NGC 246” by M. J. Post 18 “Running Man” by M. J. Post 19 “Sharpless 2-264” by Stephen Garretson 20 “Rosette to Cone in HO” by Stephen Garretson 21 “IC405” by Stephen Garretson 22 - 23 Summary of the January 21 Meeting by Vern Raben Back Cover “M45 Pleiades” by Rolando Garcia

2021 LAS Officers and Board Members • Stephen Garretson, President Board Members: • M. J. Post, Vice President Mike Hotka, Gary Garzone, • Sven Schmidt, Secretary Brian Kimball, David Elmore, • Bruce Lamoreaux, Treasurer Vern Raben Appointed Positions 2021 Paul Kammermeier, Webmaster Vern Raben, Newsletter Editor

Copyright (c) Longmont Astronomical Society, February 2021. Website: www.longmontastro.org Page 3 Solar System Highlights for January 2021 F Third Quarter: Feb. 4 at 10:38 am

New Moon: Feb. 11 at 12:07 am

First Quarter: Feb. 19 at 11:48 am

Full Moon: Feb. 27 at 1:18 am Image Credit: Brian Kimball

Mercury Meteor Showers Mercury is not visible with naked eye this month. The delta Leonids peaks on Feb. 23rd but only a couple Venus meteors per hour are expected so it is probably not worth Venus is not visible with naked eye this month. Venus the effort -- and its only a few days from full moon. and Jupiter are 1 degree 8 minutes apart on Feb. 10th just 24 minutes before sunrise. Jupiter rises at 6:34 am; Venus rises at 6:35 am; Sunrise is 6:58 am. For an 11 inch scope Venus should be detectable but Jupiter proba- bly is not visible in the bright twilight. Mars Mars is visible high in the southwestern evening sky in constellationAries; it moves to Taurus on the 23rd. On the 1st it is magnitude +0.5 in brightness and 7.8 arc sec across. On the 29th it is +0.9 in brightness and 6.4 arc sec across. Jupiter Jupiter is not visible with naked eye this month. It ap- pears low in the southeast before dawn after March 4. Saturn Saturn becomes visible in the southeastern morning sky on Feb. 26 in constellation Capricornus; it will be magnitude +0.5 in brightness and the disk will be 15 arc sec across. Uranus Uranus may be seen just below mars in the evening sky in constellation Aries. It is magnitude +5.8 in brightness and its disk is 3.5 arc sec across.

Neptune Neptune is visiblen low in the southwest in the evening sky in constellation Aquarius. It is magnitude 8.0 in Comet C/2020 M3 (ATLAS) on Jan 9 by Gary Garzone brightness and the disk is 2.2 arc sec across. It disappears into evening twilight after the 19th.

Page 4 Copyright (c) Longmont Astronomical Society, February 2021. Website: www.longmontastro.org Newsletter Archives 10 Years Ago - Feb. 2011 20 Years Ago - Feb. 2001 30 Years Ago - Feb. 1991 The February Vice President Dr. Bob meeting this Gary Garzone Stencel talk- month will be gave a short ed about his at the IHop. report about the research plans Our speaker 3rd annual star involving the is Luke Dones party at Sterling Hubble Space from SWRI. State Park which Telescope. He He will talk will be the first discussed why about discovers week of April. the Hubble was necessary, how it by the Cassini spacecraft which is Don Bunker gave a very interesting launched and what instruments it orbitting around Saturn. slide show regarding the construction contains. Dr. Bob showed slides of his cabin on an island at a remote about the success that Hubble has We will have a discussion of the lake in northern Canada. He showed already had. He also talied about MRS Observatory site and the us very nice photographs of the aurora his research around a star identified upcoming Astronomical League borealis. His talk included any inter- as R-Aquarii. It exhibits nova like conferece in Bryce Canyon this esting anecdotes about various sita- outbursts and odd charactreristics. summer. tions unique to the remote location. He will use the Faint Object Caera on Hubble to study it for 3 hrs.

Copyright (c) Longmont Astronomical Society, February 2021. Website: www.longmontastro.org Page 5 Navigating the mid February Night Sky by John Goss

Page 6 Copyright (c) Longmont Astronomical Society, February 2021. Website: www.longmontastro.org Comets in February 156P (Russell/LINEAR)

Created with SkyTools 4 Date Optimal time RA Dec Brightness Size (arc min) Constellation Feb. 1 6:57 pm 02h45m26.9s +36°50’24” 11.4 2.6 Perseus Feb. 8 7:04 pm 03h07m18.5s +38°09’34” 11.7 2.4 Perseus Feb. 15 7:11 pm 03h29m22.2s +39°11’45” 12.0 2.2 Perseus Feb. 21 7:17 pm 03h48m19.1s +39°52’34” 12.2 2.1 Perseus Feb. 28 7:24 pm 04h10m19.1s +40°26’40” 12.5 1.9 Perseus

Copyright (c) Longmont Astronomical Society, February 2021. Website: www.longmontastro.org Page 7 C/2021 A2 (NEOWISE)

Created with SkyTools 4

Date Optimal time RA Dec Brightness Size (arc min) Constellation Feb. 1 10:08 pm 07h35m49.3s -14°04’56” 10.9 5.2 Puppis Feb. 8 9:18 pm 06h45m13.9s +05°36’45” 11.1 4.9 Monoceres Feb. 15 8:22 pm 06h07m03.4s +20°45’41” 11.6 4.1 Orion Feb. 21 7:20 pm 05h43m33.8s +29°24’18” 12.1 3.4 Auriga Feb. 28 7:29 pm 05h24m28.4s +36°06’25” 12.6 2.8 Auriga

Page 8 Copyright (c) Longmont Astronomical Society, February 2021. Website: www.longmontastro.org Member Images from January 2021

“NGC 2024 Flame Nebula” by Gary Garzone

“M65 Galaxy” by Gary Garzone Copyright (c) Longmont Astronomical Society, February 2021. Website: www.longmontastro.org Page 9 “M66” by Gary Garzone

“NGC 253” by Gary Garzone Page 10 Copyright (c) Longmont Astronomical Society, February 2021. Website: www.longmontastro.org “Flame and Alnitak” by Gary Garzone

“Horsehead Nebula” by Gary Garzone

Copyright (c) Longmont Astronomical Society, February 2021. Website: www.longmontastro.org Page 11 Jim Pollock is now using Zwo Op- tical’s ASIAir Pro wifi controller to operate his telescope equipment. The ASIAir has 4 12 volt power outputs, 2 USB3 ports, and 2 USB2 ports. With the ASIAir app on his iPad Jim can control his scope, change camera set- tings, and preview his images from his living room (and perhaps sip strawber- ry margarittas?).

On the right is Jim’s new rig -- a Celestron 11” EdgeHD on iOptron CEM70. He guides with Shortube 80 400mm f/5 scape with a ZWO ASI 290mc camera. His imaging camera is a ZWO ASI 2600mc.

“M42 Orion Nebula and Running Man” by Jim Pollock Page 12 Copyright (c) Longmont Astronomical Society, February 2021. Website: www.longmontastro.org Jim Pollock’s new rig! Copyright (c) Longmont Astronomical Society, February 2021. Website: www.longmontastro.org Page 13 “Orion Nebula and Running Man” by Jim Pollock

Page 14 Copyright (c) Longmont Astronomical Society, February 2021. Website: www.longmontastro.org “Rosette Nebula” by Jim Pollock

Copyright (c) Longmont Astronomical Society, February 2021. Website: www.longmontastro.org Page 15 “Sombrero Galaxy” by Martin Butleyu

“California Nebula (without stars)” by Martin Butley Page 16 Copyright (c) Longmont Astronomical Society, February 2021. Website: www.longmontastro.org “NGC 246” by M. J. Post Copyright (c) Longmont Astronomical Society, February 2021. Website: www.longmontastro.org Page 17 ““Running Man” by M. J. Post

Page 18 Copyright (c) Longmont Astronomical Society, February 2021. Website: www.longmontastro.org “Sharpless 2-264 in H-Alpha” by Stephen Garretson

Copyright (c) Longmont Astronomical Society, February 2021. Website: www.longmontastro.org Page 19 “Rosette to Cone in HOO” by Stephen Garretson Page 20 Copyright (c) Longmont Astronomical Society, February 2021. Website: www.longmontastro.org “IC405” by Stephen Garretson Copyright (c) Longmont Astronomical Society, February 2021. Website: www.longmontastro.org Page 21 Summary of Jan. 21, 2020 Meeting Bill Tschumy opened the meeting at 7 pm. He welcomed new member Sarah Detty and visitor Lacey. Upcoming Events • Mercury is at greatest eastern elog- nation on Sat. Jan 23 • Invasion of Mars on Tue. Feb 9; three spacecraft from China, NASA, and United Arab Emerits arrive • On Februrary 10 conjunction of Venus, Jupiter, and Saturn will be within 1 degree of each other; moon will be within 5 degrees.

Presentation “The Super Soaker Sound- ing Rocket Experiment: How to Artifi- cially Create Polar Mesospheric Clouds” parts of the mesosphere and thermosphere. Changes in the ionosphere can by Dr. Irfan Azeem effect certain types of radar and radio propagation. It desirable to develop models for these changes for miliary as well as commercial interests. Dr. Azeem is chief scientist at AS- TRA. The company focuses on During the shuttle launches noctilucent clouds appeared soon after. There is a building cube research satellites for possibility that water vapor from shuttle exhaust may have formed ice crystals government clients. There are about that contributed to that phenomena. 100 people who work at the ASTRA facility in Louisville.

Prior to working at ASTRA, Irfan was project director for space weather at the National Science Foundation. Prior to that he was at the Embry-Rid- dle Aeronatical University in Florida. He was a research associate at the University of Colorado. His Phd. is in Electrical and Space Science from the University of Michigan.

He spent 5 years at the South Pole operating magnetometers and inter- ferometers. He used spectroscopy to study air glow and aurora. The south Super Soaker Rocket Launch at Poker Flats pole is great place for that research The Super Soaker Rocket Experiment goal was to artifically generate polar because of extended 6 month long mesosphic clouds (PMC) by creating ice in the mesosphere. Note - a PMC darkness and dryness. By studing ratio observed from Earth is called a noctilent cloud; when observed from a satellite of spectra of sodium and oxygen bands it is called a PMC. PMC forms between 80 and 90 km at high latitudes in the mesospheric temperature may be summer. To create a ice cloud they launched a sounding rocket into the me- computed. sopsphere and used explosives to disperse over a large area. Three rockets were launced at Poker Flat Research Range in Alaska; two rockets dispersed tracer Currently his research is focused on chemicals so they could measiure height and drift. The third rocket was for the the Earth’s ionosphere which includes Page 22 Copyright (c) Longmont Astronomical Society, February 2021. Website: www.longmontastro.org water release. softare. The group found that the con- Garzone, Brian Kimbal, Vern nection from Anydesk to OBS worked Raben They used several instruments to well. During the test they connected monitor the experiment. LIDAR to MJ’s scope which was imaging Vern Raben moved that the measured the mesospheric tempera- M42, Vern’s scope which was imaging nominated officers and board ture between 40 and 80 km and de- the moon, and David Elmore’s camera. members be elected; Gary Gar- termined size and location of the ice zone seconded. The officers and cloud from backscatter. An advanced The person operating OBS (the pro- board members were elected by mesospheric temperature mapper (an ducer) can easily get confused with acclimation. allsky camera) looked at OH layer all the open windows showing similar temperatures. The air temperature images. This would be a problem Stephen Garretson, new LAS at launch was about 20 below zero so when under pressure of a public pre- President, commented that he the rockets were encased in styrofoam sentation. Another issue was YouTube sees his role as that of a coordina- and heated from the inside. They have latency which is about 20 sec from tor or facilitator. He feels there sent a proposal to NASA to repeat the recording to display. We used Zoom to needs to be collaboration rather launch in late summer near twilight communicate with each other during than 1 or 2 members doing almost and release 4 times as much water. and the test. While great for communi- everything. He feels that LAS to launch in summer near twilight. cating with each other it also adds a having virtual star parties is excit- another window to the confusion. ing that it is going to happem. He They are also making ionospheric sees potential for them after the measurements by placing gps sensors The group feels that connecting to Covid-19 pandemic subsides. It on buoys operated by the National different scopes and operators during provides a way for more people Oceanic and Atmospheric Adminis- a virtual star party can be done. They who are unable to be phsically at a tration (NOAA). need to work out ways to coordinate telescope to participate. with each other during a presentation, Business M eeting perhaps by texting. They also need to Stephen would like to have a team practice the presentaion. The group of folks organize regular member Bruce Lamareaux, LAS treasurer, will probably do a virtual star party for observing session. He would reported that club assets increased LAS members sometime in the next like to see greater flexibility and $1142 from last month; this was month or so. quicker turn around when a star from calendar sales and membership party gets cancelled because of renewals. Vern also reported that all but 4 of the weather. LAS Calendars have been sold. The Vern Raben, board member, reported markup per calendar was $2 above He would like to look into other the virtual star party group held a test cost so the profit from the sales was venues such as the Lyons Public this week of some the software tools to around $180. Library to increase our outreach. present a star party to the public. They looked at the remote desktop software He would like to form a small Anydesk (see https://www.anydesk. cadre of people to look at making com) and the Open Broadcaster Officer Elections for 2021 the LAS website online more Software. OBS (seehttps://obsproj - Bill had to do some arm twisting (as dynamic. ect.com ). Vern gave a quick demo always) but the following officers were of Anydesk. The group found that it nominated: He would also like to tap our was easy to set up, quick, fast, and best • Stephen Garretson, President membership to be presenters at of all free for non-commercial use. It • M. J. Post, Vice President our meetings as our members have would great to use if you don’t want to • Sven Schmidt, Secretary an amazing amount of expertise be working on your notebook in the • Bruce Lamoreaux, Treasurer and talent. cold out in your backyard. Board Members: Meeting was adjourned at 8:30 Vern then gave a demo of the OBS • David Elmore, Mike Hotka, Gary pm.

Copyright (c) Longmont Astronomical Society, February 2021. Website: www.longmontastro.org Page 23 Longmont Astronomical Society PO Box 806, Longmont, CO https://www.longmontastro.org

“M45 Pleiades” by Rolado Garcia