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08 Night Sky August.Indd Published monthly since 1985 by The Binocular and Telescope Shop 84 Wentworth Park Road, Glebe NSW 2037 and 519 Burke Road, Camberwell Vic 3124 www.bintelshop.com.au August 2011 * Volume 314 MARS AS BIG AS THE MOON ? Closer than it will ever be for 50,000 years? Once-in-a-lifetime view? No, no and no. “Planet Mars will be the brightest in the night sky starting August. It will look as large as the full moon to the naked Eye. This will happen On Aug. 27 when Mars comes within 34.65M miles of earth. Be sure to watch The sky on Aug. 27 12:30 am. It will look like the earth has 2 moons. The Next time Mars may come this close is in 2287. Share this with your friends as NO ONE ALIVE TODAY Will ever see it again.” quoted from the Internet... and we all know that everything on the Internet is factually true. Actually the distance to Mars this month on the 27th is going to be 301, 047,862.5 kilometres, twice as far from us as the Sun. The planet will be If you visit the Sutherland As- approximately 1.4 Magnitude in brightness. Con- tronomical Society’s impressive trast this with the planet’s distance on 27th Au- observatory set-up near Como gust 2003 when it was just 55.7 million kilome- in the ‘Shire’ you will see what tres from Earth and was several times brighter. dedication, persistence and hard So, why does this error keep cropping up every slog can achieve. Well done fell- year? ers and ladies of the SASI! The original commentary included the phrase “... as seen through a telescope...” when comparing * * * Mars to the Moon as seen with the naked eye. The Square Kiometre Array ra- This small but important point was missed by a dio telescope has two contend- few. Their ‘interpretation’ of the event, either from ers- Australia and South Africa. ignorance or malice rushed around the world, It needs to be situated in an area gaining momentum as it went. Unfortunately a where there is little radio interfer- few hapless souls keep repeating this nonsense ence so that the antennae can pick every year. Believe me, it won’t happen! up the faint emissions from deep space. Now, if Australia is cho- sen what’s the chances of some mining mob finding coal/oil/dia- SUTHERLAND ASTRONOMICAL SOCIETY monds/iron ore within a few ki- lometres and demanding the right to dig in the middle of it? .... and REACHES THE HALF CENTURY. CELEBRATES ! getting government approval? * * * The recent astro-imaging confer- ence held on he Gold Coast was a great success. The more than a hundred keen amateur astrono- mers who attended had a very intensive and rewarding confer- ence. Makes you wonder where we’ll be in ten years from now. Ten years ago the number of suc- cessful amateur astronomers tak- ing photographs of the sky could be counted on one hand. Now there are hundreds. Amateurs regularly supplement NASA’s ef- forts to image the planets. Ama- teur astronomy is definitely look- ing up! Artistic Photography corralled over one hundred and thirty present and past members of the Suherland Astronomical Society in the * * * one place and at the same time for a remarkable image of a galaxy of shining stars from the Shire’s foremost scientific organization. Bendigo District Astronomical The Sutherland Astronomical society was formed in June 1961, as the James The society’s logo is the galaxy NGC2997 in Antlia, one of the most beautiful Society is observing National Cook Astronomers Club. Like many groups in Sutherland Shire, it honoured spirals in the southern hemisphere. The society was instrumental in organising Science Week on Friday August Captain James Cook, the English explorer who discovered the East Coast of the first National Australian Convention of Amateur Astronomers in Katoomba 19th by having an Open Night Australia and landed at Kurnell, after successfully observing a Transit of Venus in 1966 and has hosted or co-hosted NACAA on three other occasions since at Quarry Hill Golf Course- in from Tahiti. The James Cook Astronomical Club was then.The society currently has a membership of just over 200 with many active conjunction with the Discovery granted council land at Oyster Bay, on members. Science and Technology Cen- the southern outskirts of Sydney, and in Members of the society have made tre. The event will begin at 6pm, 1969 started construction on its Green some significant discoveries: giving the littlies time to have a Point Observatory which was to be of - Comet 1998 P1/Williams discovered look at the Jewel Box, Omega a dome construction eventually housing by Life Member and prolific Variable Centauri and maybe the Small an F7 16” reflector . A meeting hall was Star observer Peter Williams in Au- Magellanic Galaxy before head- added in 1974, and the observatory was gust, 1998. ing home to bed. further extended in 1997 when a roll-off - Comet 1999 H1/Lee discovered by roof observatory, housing a C14 tele- member Steven Lee in March, 1999. * * * scope, was added beside the dome obser- - Nova V382 Velorum discovered by Who has the best story to tell vatory. The two buildings were merged Life Member Peter Williams in May, about that ‘first time’ looking in 2007 and the hall was extended. 1999 (independently co-discovered by through a telescope? Remem- In 1972 the group’s name was changed P.Williams&A. Gilmore) Brendon Bell. ber when you first saw Saturn’s to the James Cook Astronomical Society rings or Jupiter’s moons? In two and in 1978 to Sutherland Astronomical We congratulate the Sutherland Astro- hundred words or A history of the Society, written to less... let me know. Society. nomical Society on fifty good years! Founding member Frank Napier coincide with the 50th anniversary. speaks at the SASI 50th Dinner. Best (or funniest) story wins a copy Mel looks at a horse’s tail .............2 subscribe to NIGHT SKY of classic Collins Oddie to rise again ........................2 Receive your copy every month free by email. Get an ‘Stars and Planets’. Star Map for August .....................3 eyeful of sky news in the mail or on your computer. Best stories will be Mick ‘n Don ....................................4 Details at the bottom of Page 4 printed in Night Sky.. The Binocular and Telescope Shop, 84 Wentworth Park Road, Glebe NSW 2037. Tel: 02 9518 7255 The Binocular and Telescope Shop, 519 Burke Road, Camberwell Vic 3124. Tel: 03 9822 0033 August 2011 * Volume 314 * Page 2 Harry’s on to Smithy. MEL LOOKS RIGHT UP AND SEES A STRANGE HORSE Sagittarius the four-legged, two armed archer. The end of winter sees the constella- M22 (NGC 6656) is a large globular tion Sagittarius high in our night sky. cluster. It is visible to the naked eye Sagittarius sits below the prominent (in dark skies) and appears as a fuzzy constellation of Scorpius. Sagittarius blob in binoculars and it takes a 75mm is depicted as a half man, half horse telescope or greater to reveal some of aiming an arrow towards Scorpius. In the outer stars, some of the brightest mythology the Greeks associated Cro- appearing to have a reddish hue. Even tus (half man, half goat with a long small telescopes will reveal its ellipti- tail like a horse) with Sagittarius, the cal outline. M22 is considered to be Romans with Chiron the gentle and one of the finest examples in the sky, wise centaur (similar to Centaurus) third only to omega (ω) Centauri and but Sagittarius is different, in that he 47 Tucanae. The nucleus is not as con- has a war-like posture with his arrow densed as many of the other globulars Some sites are very rare sights. aimed at Scorpius. It is thought that and it lies about 10,000 light years Seldom Seen – Smythii. The ‘scope showed a round North of it was shallower Sagittarius can be traced back to the away. The Moon offers many basin, almost side-on, ringed by a low Banachiewicz. This eye-catching cra- Mesopotamian archer-god Nergal, M20 (NGC 6514) or the Trifid Nebula amazing vistas – some may be once unbroken rim, higher in places, with a ter contained a brilliant white cres- who was associated with the wrathful is a large gaseous cloud of gas. It gets in a lifetime views! Riccioli named smooth floor and hints of low “hills” cent that is crater Banachiewicz B, the god Irra of war and fire. However, in its name from three dark dust lanes of the lunar “seas” after moods, weather on the sunset horizon. The view was brightest thing in the whole field. SE our night sky Sagittarius looks more dust that cross the nebula. It is not as or geographic terms – but there are much like those from Apollo era cap- of Banachiewicz were Schubert and like a teapot than any of these mythi- impressive visually, but moderate-size two exceptions: Humboldt’s Sea and sules, a spectacular oblique vista! Back, two fresh craters on Smythii’s cal creatures. telescopes show a diffuse glow (the Smyth’s Sea (the latter was a Brit- An astronaut standing in rim. Interestingly, the Sun lies in Sagit- dark dust lanes can be easily seen if ish astronomical Admiral). Both are Smythii would see the sun setting South of Smythii we find fresh la tarius from mid-December until mid- the seeing conditions are good) with 19th C additions to the original list of in the west at altitude 6o –casting Pérouse - with its historic Sydney January, meaning that it lies in this the brightest region of the nebula cen- “seas”.
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