R I Z O O Vol. 14 Issue 1 LA SOCIÉTÉ ROYALE D’ASTRONOMIE DU CANADA New Brunswick Centre du Nouveau-Brunswick Winter 2013 H THE ROYAL ASTRONOMICAL SOCIETY OF CANADA N
The Man behind the Image Roger Pitre
One of our best astroimagers, master colli- The Great Orion Nebula (M42) by Roger Pitre mator, wheeler-dealer, scourge of the for- est, volunteer fireman, obedient husband, This shot was taken through my 70 mm f/6 Stellarvue refractor, reduced to f/4.8. The avid supporter of the barley/hops industry, camera was my SBIG ST2000, and this is a composite of images with exposures of 3 and life of the star parties. seconds to 5 minutes, through LRGB Astrodon filters. Photo courtesy of Emma MacPhee EVENT HORIZON Outreach Events Astronomy in New Brunswick SRAC/RASC Centre du NB Centre NB Astronomy Clubs March 16 STEM Expo Réunion / Meetings Réunion / Meetings Bliss Carman School ------William Brydone-Jack Astronomy Fredericton When: March 9, 2013 13:00 Club (Fredericton) A local group of members meet in Freder- March 23 Earth Hour Where: UNB Fredericton icton monthly for meetings and observing. Forestry-Earth Science Building April 15 - 21 Astronomy Week 2 Bailey Drive, Room 203 When: March 12 at 19:00
April 9 at 19:00 When: April 13, 2013 13:00 April 20 International Astronomy Where: Fredericton, UNB Campus Day 2 Bailey Drive, Room 203 Where: Université de Moncton Engineering Building www.frederictonastronomy.ca Star Parties 2013 Room G148 ------
When: June 1, 2013 13:00 Saint John Astronomy Club Kouchibouguac National Park May 31 - June 1 Where: Kouchibouguac Park Meetings consist of talks on constella- Outdoor Theatre tions, the solar system and other astronom- COW Mactaquac Provincial Park Of course it will be sunny! ical topics, as well as Show & Tell, ob- July 12 - 14 serving reports and maybe observing. When: June 15, 2013 13:00 When: April 6 at 19:00 Mount Carleton Provincial Park May 4 at 19:00 August 2 - 4 Where: UNB Fredericton Forestry-Earth Science Building The SJAC meetings are normally held 2 Bailey Drive, Room 203 on the first Saturday of the month at Fundy National Park Rockwood Park Interpretation Centre. August 30 - September 1 www.nb.rasc.ca www.sjastronomy.ca See Page 4 for details!
SRAC NB RASC — Volume 14, Issue 1 — Page 2 Horizon: instruire, informer et inspirer President’s Report Grade 9 students at École L'Odyssée in for 40 Cubs and parents in Rothesay - by Curt Nason Moncton January 17, observing for 25 students October 21, observing for 15 members and parents of Rothesay Elementary As of the end of February, our Centre and parents of the Silly Frogs Junior January 24, presentation to 50 Grade 9 membership stands at 65. A few have Diabetes Group in Saint John students and teachers at École Sainte- dropped out over the winter for various October 21, observing for 5 residents Anne in Fredericton reasons, and we have one new member. of the Sainte Anne’s Retirement Home January 26, public observing for 40 Welcome to Douglas Margison in Freder- in Fredericton moonlight hikers at Irving Nature Park icton! Since the last newsletter, June Mac- October 23, observing for 6 students at February 12, presentation for 30 Bea- Donald has completed ten years as a mem- the Experimental Farm in Lincoln vers, Cubs and parents in Saint John ber, and Thomas Buckingham, Ted Gull October 31, presentation to 125 stu- February 13, presentation for 40 Grade and Mike Powell have completed five dents at Saint Rose Elementary School 6 students and teachers at Millidgeville years. Also renewing since the last news- in Saint John North Middle School in Saint John letter are Fran Alborg, Marc Arsenault, November 9, public observing for 50 February 26, observing for 30 Path- Holly Ayles, James Ayles, Dave Beaudin, people at Rockwood Park in Saint John finders, Guides and leaders at Rock- Adrien Bordage, Richard Bourque, Bob November 19, presentation and observ- wood Park in Saint John Bowser, Bruce Boyd, Angela Davis, Diane ing for 22 Guides and leaders in Grand DeGrâce, Ted Dunphy, Yvon Hachey, Bob Bay-Westfield Earth Hour is March 23 at 20:30, and As- Hawkes, Malcolm Jardine, Don MacPhail, November 20, presentation and observ- tronomy Week runs April 15 - 21. Think Mike Mersereau, Curt Nason, Joe Peters, ing for 25 Brownies and leaders in about what you can do on these occasions Eldon Rogers, David Ross, Detlef Ru- Quispamsis to introduce someone to the pleasures of dolph, François Theriault, and Chris November 27, STEM exhibition with astronomy. Weadick. Science East for 30 in Florenceville- Bristol area Our biennial election for Centre Council We continue to distinguish ourselves na- up to December 11, education sessions was held during the Annual Meeting in tionally in public outreach. Centre out- on light pollution abatement for 13 Moncton last October, and the results are reach events since the last issue of Hori- December 12, STEM exhibition and shown on the last page. I welcome Angela zon in October 2012 have been (date, observing with Science East for 150 in Davis to her first term as Councillor, and number of public participants, event): St. Andrews the return of Don Kelly to that position af- up to October 6, observing for 57 peo- January 14, 22 and 28, presentations ter a hiatus from Council. Thanks to the ple over nine sessions at Hanwell Ob- for 20 Grade 1/2 students and teachers others who have offered to continue to servatory at Rothesay Elementary School serve the Centre, and to Mandy Bregg for October 10, four presentations to 120 January 15, presentation and observing her work as Treasurer in 2011-2012.
SRAC NB RASC — Volume 14, Issue 1 — Page 3 Horizon: to educate, inform, and inspire Notes from the Star Party and Mactaquac (as before). There is one change over the years. Perhaps the parks and Events Committee free site for two nights at Kouchibouguac may request that some kind of public - by June MacDonald for the organizer, and one free night for presentation be made, so we will play it by two other people who volunteer to help ear. During the evening public observing Plans are under way for the 2013 “Star during the weekend. You will need to con- someone will do a simple What’s Up for Party Season.” It’s a chance to not only get tact the Parks directly to book your the public, using a laser pointer to identify some observing in, but to socialize and get campsite. Please tell them you are with prominent objects and how to find things to know other members, check out others’ RASC NB so they will place us all in the in the sky. This will hopefully make it eas- astronomy equipment, talk about all things same area. Emma will get approval from ier for people to follow what they see at astronomical and introduce the public to the Department of Transport to use laser the eyepiece and to remember when they the wonderful world of the cosmos. A re- pointers at each of the parks. are on their own. minder will be sent out a month prior to each weekend. The dates are: We are looking to improve the signage so We will try to do a better job of counting the camping/observing site can be found how many of the public attend each week- Kouchibouguac: May 31 - June 1 more easily. We are also talking about us- end. This helps the parks and the commit- COW (Mactaquac): July 12 - 14 ing some identification so club members tee to make plans, and provides proof of Mount Carleton: August 2 - 4 can be easily identified by the public. We the public interest. Fundy: August 30 - September 1 will have Moon Gazers’ Guides and Star Finders, as well as a few other handouts Well, these are the plans so far. If you The weekends consist of solar and dark for the public. There are plans to make a have any questions or suggestions, please sky observing for the public and (after short list of familiar night sky objects to notify me at [email protected]. We hope public observing) members. There will be ensure the public gets to see these com- many of our members will be able to at- a Star BQ group supper at Mactaquac and mon sights, in addition to the more exotic tend our RASC NB family gatherings this Fundy. You are on your own for meals at deep sky objects. year and that they will be as successful as Kouchibouguac and Mount Carleton. Also last year. at Mactaquac, there will be a Swap Table Adrien will be organizing public solar ob- set up if anyone would like to bring along serving, so if anyone with the proper Your Star Party & Events Committee astronomy equipment to sell or swap. If it equipment can assist please notify him. turns out to be a popular activity it will Adrien will also be doing a Telescope June MacDonald continue next year and may become part Clinic on Saturday afternoon at some of Emma MacPhee the other star parties. the star parties. There will be no talks this Adrien Bordage year, as the talks last year were not as suc- Curt Nason (ex officio) There will be free camping only at Fundy cessful as had been hoped. This may
SRAC NB RASC — Volume 14, Issue 1 — Page 4 Horizon: instruire, informer et inspirer Focus on… focused on it and it turned out to be Sat- ual hobby; you gotta love it to stick with urn!!! With the rings and a few moons!!! Diane DeGrâce it. My Dad heard me shriek and thought I had dropped the telescope. Needless to Tell us about your outreach efforts and When and how did you become interest- say, you can’t beat that sight, especially your hopes for further outreach. ed in astronomy? because it wasn’t expected. I am the contact person for the new astron- In general, my childhood memory is poor Second: Seeing solar flares and promi- omy program here at my work, the CCNB but this I remember clear as day. I was in nences for the first time on Eloi Lan- (Bathurst Community College). I go to lo- Grade 5, so about 10 years old, and I was teigne’s 12” Meade. That was remarkable. cal public schools and our nature park and leaning on the oil tank in the back of our Third: Seeing the Veil Nebula at Mt Car- give presentations. It’s always fun to talk house looking up at the Moon. What I was leton park. I believe it was through Ted’s to the public about astronomy; it brings doing there in the first place, I have no telescope. out the curiosity in all of us. As a teacher, I idea. As I was staring at the Moon, it often say: “Learning starts with curiosity. dawned on me that the Moon was a Without it we learn poorly; with it, we sphere; not a flat disk, but an actual sphere evolve.” sticking out toward me. It really changed my thinking. My entire outlook of the sky If you were given $1000 for astronomy and its spatial arrangement changed in that equipment, what would you buy? one instant. Space wasn’t just pretty pic- I would give it to an inventor toward the tures in books anymore, it was real 3- design of a feet heating device for winter dimensional space and it was really out observing. there. I may not have had the vocabulary at the time, but I am convinced something What could we do to make our meetings clicked in my brain and my spatial cogni- more interesting and useful? tive awareness was awakened. I’ve been I think you guys are doing a terrific job as wonderstruck by astronomy ever since. Diane does a What’s Up is. I wouldn’t change a thing. I admire and
What enticed you to join the RASC? APPRECIATE your devotion to the hob- What have been your top 3 observa- Astronomy has always been a solitary by. It allows me, as a member, to benefit tions? hobby for me and joining RASC is a way by sharing and socializing with others “of First: In my late teens, I was setting up my to share time with people that understand my kind,” and hopefully, I can return the brand new, top of the line, 8” Meade in the your passion for stuff you’ll never be able favor in the future by being more involved backyard in Tremblay Settlement. I was to touch, feel, smell or taste. A purely vis- as an organizer. aiming at a bright star. I “caught” it and I
SRAC NB RASC — Volume 14, Issue 1 — Page 5 Horizon: to educate, inform, and inspire Observing the Venus Trans- The basic method is to 1) determine the the edge of the Sun and then suddenly let it from Hawaii exact contact times; 2) calculate the dura- go (Captain Cook’s notes mention this dif- tion; 3) do the same for another location; (Part 2 of 2) by Detlef Rudolph ficulty and the resulting large variances 4) calculate the parallax angle (the tiny an- among the various Tahiti observers); and gle between the position of Venus as seen Analysis of the photographic also the slight blurring and pixellation of from the two locations); 5) calculate the the edges of the Sun and Venus when the data and calculation of the distance of Venus from the Earth; 6) and photos were greatly enlarged on the com- Earth’s distance from the Sun then, using the relative distance of Venus puter screen, due to the resolution of the from the Sun in AU (from Kepler’s third (Part 1 was in the Sept-Oct 2012 Horizon.) camera. We just looked at each other, be- law), calculate the AU -- the Earth-Sun cause we really couldn’t decide which pic- distance. This is all very straightforward. After my fruitful trip to Hawaii to observe ture was the correct one. We thought we and photograph the 2012 transit of Venus, had one, and then another one turned out My photos of the Sun turned out quite it was time to make sense of the data. The to look just as good. I needed to invent a well. The stiff breeze on Mauna Kea made intention was to duplicate Captain James way around this, and fortunately Pho- about 8 out of 10 shots blurred and unusa- Cook’s 1769 expedition to Tahiti, timing toshop came to the rescue. ble, but having taken groups of three or the transit from two different locations, more meant that at any particular time and using Edmund Halley’s method of de- Enlarging there were several good ones from which termining the distance of the Earth from the images to choose. The camera had recorded the the Sun (the astronomical unit, AU). in Pho- time to the nearest second, and the refer- toshop al- ence clock gave us the offset correction, The geometry of Halley’s method involves lowed me to enabling us to get the exact UTC time for some very challenging math, so we chose draw a line every frame. a simplified method that only required that was some basic trigonometry. This required tangent to First came the task of identifying the pho- only the exact contact times for Contacts the edge of tos that corresponded to Contacts II and II and III. First contact is almost impossi- the Sun at III, so the student, Justine, studied the im- ble because Venus touches the Sun’s pho- the point of contact, and also draw a white ages close up. Oops! Here comes Mur- tosphere out of blackness, unless a filter is circle overlaying the silhouette of Venus. phy’s Law! It turned out that two optical used that is able to show Venus progress- The photo that had the white circle just effects happened which made this diffi- ing through the chromosphere. In any touching the tangent line would be the cult: the so-called black drop effect, where case, we didn’t need to use first or fourth photo at the exact moment of contact. the silhouette of Venus appears to cling to contact. With a bit—well okay, a lot—of practice on several frames, this turned out to be SRAC NB RASC — Volume 14, Issue 1 — Page 6 Horizon: instruire, informer et inspirer quite satisfactory. I started with third con- A second location is needed that had the Wow. That tricky part was over. Now, on tact, which seemed to be the simpler one, entire transit visible. Two candidates were to the math! examined several frames around the ex- Sydney, Australia, and Anchorage, Alaska. pected contact time, and found the perfect We settled on Anchorage since the longi- I won’t bore you with the details of the ge- one. This gave us a time of 04:26:42 UTC tude is similar to Hawaii, making a longi- ometry and the calculation of the parallax for Contact III. So far so good. This tude correction unnecessary. An on-line angle for Venus. If you really want to looked promising. search turned up no original contact time know, I’d be happy to send you my Pow- observations at Anchorage, so we decided erPoint presentation that shows the angles Then on to Contact II. Oops! Murphy to use the published times in the Observ- and the trigonometry required. I will just again. Much to my surprise, there was not er’s Handbook (2012 p. 151). It is really say that the Observer’s Handbook (2012 p. one single shot that was taken at the cor- the time difference between Contacts II 147) came in very handy (in fact essential) rect time. Was I dozing? Now what? I pan- and III that is important. For Anchorage for determining the angular position of icked slightly, thinking that the whole trip the duration was 22,002 seconds, 474 sec- Contacts II and III from the centre of the would be for nothing! onds longer than Hawaii. Sun, as well as the details for Anchorage, and that several Web sites gave me the Then it occurred to me that since Venus techniques to wade through the method. was moving at a constant speed I could look at a “before contact” and “after con- It turns out that the Anchorage-Hawaii tact” photo (with their exact times) and get parallax angle is only 1/180 of a degree, a the distance of each one from the edge of very tiny value! Does this have any hope the Sun. Then I could use the ratio of dis- of giving a result? Well, yes, it does. Us- tance to time to estimate the correct sec- ing this tiny angle along with the Anchor- ond contact time. I got the two photos on age-Hawaii distance of 4308 km the screen, took out my ruler, and meas- (perpendicular to the ecliptic) gives us a ured the pictures. I interpolated from both Venus-Earth distance of 42.08 million km. directions as a double check, and got the same time. Good! This gave me a time of The mean distance of Venus is 0.277 AU 22:27:54 UTC for Contact II. I did deter- from the mean distance of Earth. Howev- mine that this had an uncertainty of ± 8 er, on June 5 both planets were near aphe- seconds. The duration of transit was lion, and the Observer’s Handbook (2012 21,528 seconds. Detlef gives his neck a break from p. 102) states they were 0.289 AU apart on looking straight up at the Sun that date.
SRAC NB RASC — Volume 14, Issue 1 — Page 7 Horizon: to educate, inform, and inspire So, dividing the Venus-Earth distance by Teaching Grade 9 about light, whatever they could think of. I 0.289 I obtained a value for the astronomi- Light Pollution found it gave them a better understanding cal unit of 146 ± 3 million km. This com- of my project and what the readings meant - by Holly Ayles pares very favourably with the true value when they could see and test it for them- of 149.60 million km. selves. On January 24 I had the opportunity to Thus with a simple digital camera, a Gal- speak to two ninth grade science classes at I talked about going around New Mary- ileoscope, a good location and good about light pollution. It was a great oppor- land to get the readings and showed a few weather, it was possible to do something tunity for both me and the students. I real- students who happened to live in New interesting, educational, and even aston- ly enjoyed speaking to them and I'd like to Maryland what the readings were near ishing. I hope this may inspire others to go think they enjoyed having me there. their houses. I told them about where the beyond simple stargazing and observing, project has taken me and all the crazy and to actually take some measurements, I began by briefly introducing the concept things that have happened to me since I such as apparent brightness of variable of light pollution and then proceeded to won the poster contest. stars, or shadow lengths of craters on the explain its effects on animals, humans, as- Moon. Just use your imagination. tronomy, and the environment. The teach- I spoke a little more in depth about what I er had them trying to guess what the ef- consider to be the highlight of this experi- We had hoped to extend this project by fects were and I was quite impressed with ence: winning the Ken Chilton Prize and measuring the dimming of the Sun as Ve- how many correct answers I got. meeting Jocelyn Bell Burnell. I finished nus passed in front of it, which is one way up by telling them about the RASC and of finding extrasolar planets. The Hawaii I then explained that, as an amateur as- the WBJAC, should any of them be inter- photos and a very sensitive light meter tronomer, light pollution was a subject that ested in astronomy, and encouraged them might make that possible, but that will be affected me, so I chose it as a topic for my to come out sometime. for another day. Is anyone interested? eighth grade science fair project. I showed them my poster and explained what I had Afterwards, the teacher asked me if I'd References: done for my project. It was at this point like to come back next semester to give http://www-istp.gsfc.nasa.gov/ that I pulled out the Sky Quality Meter the same presentation. All in all, I have to stargaze/Svenus3.htm (SQM) and let the kids experiment with it say it was a success! http://www.exploratorium.edu/ a little bit. I had them compare the read- venus/question4.html ings when the classroom lights were on, http://brightstartutors.com/blog/2012/ when the classroom lights were off, when the-transit-of-venus their hands were over the top of the SQM, when they were closer to the classroom
SRAC NB RASC — Volume 14, Issue 1 — Page 8 Horizon: instruire, informer et inspirer OBSERVERS’ SCORECARD President/Président
Curt Nason
1st Vice-President/-Président
Marc Arsenault
Hickson
Deep Sky Challenge Dark Nebulae Herschel 400
Finest Finest NGC Levy Deep Gems Sky
I.William- Lunarson
Universe Messier Caldwell Arp Galaxies Abell Galaxy Clusters Explore the the Explore James Ayles 37 2nd Vice-President/-Président June MacDonald Adrien Bordage 100 [email protected]
Charles Doucet 110 110 110 65 Secretary/Secrétaire Ted Dunphy 102 110 110 51 10 8 265 James Ayles [email protected] Colette Fortier 87 28 Peter Jensen 12 73 Treasurer/Trésorier Emma MacPhee Don Kelly 110 110 [email protected]
Danny LeBlanc 110 110 127 8 21 21 9 Past Pres./Président sortant Emma MacPhee 78 110 110 5 Peter Jensen [email protected] Curt Nason 110 110 Councillors /Conseillers Mike Powell 70 Angela Davis Detlef Rudolph 62 Don Kelly Roger Pitre Chris Weadick 71 26 Chris Weadick
Light Pollution Chair Chris Weadick Education-Outreach Chair This section is intended to inspire our members to get out observing by promoting a friendly Don Kelly competition. To be included please contact Peter Jensen. Star Party-Events Chair June MacDonald
Web Site: Marc Arsenault Equipment: Eldon Rogers Library: Ted Dunphy
SRAC NB RASC — Volume 14, Issue 1— Page 9 Horizon: to educate, inform, and inspire