The Messier Marathon at Henry Coe State Park Vivek Mohan It began, like almost all activities, and no amount of tweaking, prodding, However, locating objects without with a groan. “Come on, it’s a Saturday or adjusting it could fix the problem. a viewfinder was proving to be a difficult night, do we have to go to the Messier Using the other scope, we quickly exercise. M81 was the next object on Marathon?” “Let’s watch a movie located the easiest of the Messier the list, and it was more difficult to instead.” It ended, also, with a groan, objects — M42 and M43, otherwise locate than it should have been. We but on a different note — “Are we known as Orion’s Nebula and de decided to take a walk around and look leaving already?” “Can’t we stay a little Mairan’s Nebula (located slightly below at the other telescopes there. Some of longer?” All in all, the Messier Marathon Orion’s belt.) Another easy-to-locate the very large scopes, a 20” scope and at Henry Coe State Park was a fun object, M36, in Auriga, was next. The 18” scope, were next to us. We kept experience. other two Messier objects in Auriga, admiring the scopes themselves, which We loaded our 6” dob (on loan M37 and M38, were easy to find from from SJAA) and drove over to our there. Continued on next page friend’s house. Mr. Kumar brought his 6” equatorial and his 10 year old son, SJAA activities calendar Jim Van Nuland “When it was time to leave, my younger brother and I May June asked for the traditional 3 Deep sky weekend. Sunset 7:59 6 Houge Park star party, 9:30 p.m. p.m., 7% Moon sets 10:23 p.m. to midnight. Sunset 8:25 p.m., ‘five more minutes’ ...” 9 Houge Park star party, 9:00 p.m. 43% Moon sets 1:39 a.m to midnight. Sunset 8:04 p.m., 7 ATM class. Houge Park, 7:30 p.m. 57% Moon sets 3:06 a.m. 14 General meeting, Houge Park. and we were set to go. We ascended 10 ATM class. Houge Park, 7:30 p.m. 8:00 p.m. Scott Sandford, the mountain on a long and winding Astronomy Day observed May 9 Stardust mission (to be confirmed) road. Twelve miles of twisting mountain 15 Lunar Eclipse. Sunset 8:09 p.m. 19 ATM class. Houge Park, 7:30 p.m. road without guardrails was enough to Moon rises in eclipse 8:03 p.m. 20 Astronomy class. Houge Park, make anyone wonder if this was going 17 General meeting, Houge Park. 7:30 p.m. subject TBA to be worth the while. When we 8:00 p.m. Norm Sperling on his 20 Houge Park star party. Sunset reached the small parking lot at the new book What Your Astronomy 8:31 p.m., 552% Moon rises 1:24 peak in fading daylight, we drove past Textbook Won’t Tell You a.m. Star party hours 9:30 p.m. to all kinds of amazing scopes ranging 22 ATM class. Houge Park, 7:30 p.m. midnight from 4” to 20” behemoths. Pulling into 23 Astronomy class. Houge Park, 21 Deep sky weekend. Sunset 8:31 one of the few empty parking spots, we 7:30 p.m., subject TBA p.m., 43% Moon rises 1:47 a.m. quickly unpacked our two small 23 Houge Park star party, 9:30 p.m. 28 Deep sky weekend. Sunset 8:32 scopes. However, we soon realized that to midnight. Sunset 8:16 p.m., p.m., 0% Moon rises 5:31 a.m. the viewfinder on our dob was broken, 39% Moon rises 2:56 a.m. 25-30 Wednesday - Monday 24 Deep sky weekend. Sunset 8:17 Shingletown Star party p.m., 27% Moon rises 3:21 a.m. 31 Deep sky weekend. Sunset 8:22 The Board of Directors meet at 6:30 p.m., 1% Moon rises 9:15 p.m. p.m. preceding each general meeting. All are welcome. Observers getting ready for the Messier 24 Hour News and Information Hotline: (408) 559-1221 Marathon at Henry Coe State Park. Photo by Paul Kohlmiller. http://www.sjaa.net Copyright © 2003 San Jose Astronomical Association, Inc. Volume 14 Number 4 Official Publication of the San Jose Astronomical Association, April 2003 Messier Marthon Messier Marathon 2003 — March 29/30, 2003 Continued from previous page Bob Brauer involved precision work by their owners A big “thank you” should go out to back to pickup the 4 objects in Cyg- who built them. The gentlemen who had Bob Havner for organizing the 2003 nus, Vulpecula, and Sagitta which have built these incredible scopes were very SJAA Messier Marathon. His email risen higher in the sky. (Search order: friendly and patient with us as they notices got me eager to get out under 71, 72, 77 to 87, then go back for 73 to showed us several Messier objects. the stars for a full night of observing. 76, forward to 88, 89, and so forth.) Using the 18” which was partially The week leading up to our official This year added three nice computer controlled, we focused on marathon night featured some of the planetary appearances to the Mara- M81 and 82, Bode’s Galaxy and the best clear skies I had seen in months, thon: Saturn was still quite close to Cigar Galaxy. We took a look and were but it was not destined to last. Increas- M1; M44 & Jupiter practically merged amazed. We saw M81 as a huge ing haze and high thin clouds filled the into one cluster with all 4 Galilean spiral, with a small elongated shape to sky by Saturday afternoon. Fortunately moons stretched out between the the left — M82. Looking through that a strong north to south airflow kept dry planet and the cluster; and small but telescope was amazing — almost as if air over our observing site all night long. growing Mars in the morning sky. Vesta one was in an observatory. Dew was not a problem. reached opposition the day before our One of the gentlemen with the I chose to use two refractors for marathon and delighted us with observ- large scopes prompted us to bring the my Messier observations. I bolted a able motion as it passed background defective dob over and volunteered to 4.8-inch f/5 (Orion ST120) onto a 4-inch stars in Virgo near 12:38 R.A. and +09 locate M81 for us without the viewfinder. f/10 (Celestron C102), giving me a deg 38 min dec. from 12:30 a.m. to I brought the scope to him and he short, fast, widefield view side-by-side 3:30 a.m. easily pointed it towards M81. Sure with a sharp, higher magnification view. So how did I do? Well, when I enough, it was just as amazing through lived back east, my Messier our humble six-inch dob. Then we used “This year added three nice marathoning usually found 40 or 50 the 18” scope to see an amazing objects between and through the combination -– Saturn and M1, the planetary appearances to the clouds. Out here in the west, my Crab Nebula, in a single field of view in Marthon ...” previous best total was 87. This year I the 18” scope, as they happened to be found 103, missing M77, M74, M33, very close together in the sky. What a M32, M110, M79, and M30. Perhaps contrast! The ST120 combined with a 40mm more impressive is that 4 observers We moved to another telescope, eyepiece and a Skyview filter gave stuck with the marathon through the this one a smaller ten-inch, and helped around 3 degrees of field-of-view, which entire night. It was fun. look for clusters. In Leo, we found the is well matched to the finder charts in — Bob Brauer, elusive (at least for us) galaxies of M95 the Messier Marathon Observer’s Guide [email protected] and M96. Back at our base camp, we by Don Machholz. learned to use our other telescope, one As the evening darkened into Directions to Houge Park on an equatorial mount with tracking. night, haze on the western horizon With a fair dose of luck and help, we blocked five of the first six search Houge (rhymes with “Yogi”) located M45 in Taurus. By the time we objects. Not the best way to start Park is in San Jose, near Campbell had done all this, it was getting quite perhaps, but that’s part of the chal- and Los Gatos. From Hwy. 17, take late and we were feeling somewhat lenge. By 9:30 p.m., I was well into the the Camden Avenue exit. Go east cold. hunt. 0.4 miles, and turn right at the light, When it was time to leave, my The last time I tried the Messier onto Bascom Avenue. At the next younger brother Vijay and I asked for Marathon, I got caught in a trap at light, turn left onto Woodard Road. the traditional “five more minutes,” Cygnus. When I finished M57 and M56 At the first stop sign, turn right onto hoping to get my parents hooked for in Lyra, Don’s search order indicates a Twilight Drive. Go three blocks, another half hour or so. However, we move east to find M29 in Cygnus. At 2 cross Sunrise Drive, then turn left had to leave, as both of our families had a.m., Cygnus is low in the east and I into the park.