Mars 2020 apparition... A few drawings.

The 2020 Mars apparition has so far  been a bit tricky.  Many nights of bad seeing, and lots of cloudy evenings. 

On the whole I have only been able to capture the odd evening of Mars viewing. 

But those evenings you see above, more than made up for the lousy weather.

Mars on a typewriter

 

Welcome back Mars.

August 9th 2020 : 04h00mUT 76mm O.G. x112 Antoniadi I

Early this morning the world of John Carter, Tharks, Synthetic men and dreamers finally came back to life.

It has been a long wait, at least four years since I last had a decent glimpse of this most wonderful and enchanting of planets.

My 76mm refractor revealed with ease the white bright polar caps, the gibbous planetary phase, a hint of Mare Sirenum, and most interestingly a whisper of light over two small areas of the Tharsis region.

To my mind one of those small light areas might be connected to nearby Mons Olympus, the highest volcano on the martian surface.
Was I seeing the Nix Olympus "The Snows of Olympus"?

I made a quick sketch, said hello to John Carter, and dreamed the astronomer's dream, for maybe another half hour.
The night was now fast giving way to the day, I slowly packed away the telescope, and made a few notes.

This was my first observation of the 2020/21 apparition, the planet was 15.6 arc seconds in diameter.
From now until October, Mars is just going to increase in size.

The next few months are going to be exciting.

Welcome back Mars, you have been sorely missed.

Clear Martian skies

Mark.

Is the climate changing?

An entry from one of my favourite astronomy books "The Stars Night by Night" by Joseph H. Elgie.

This is his journal entry for May 1st 1907!  113 years ago to the day....WOW!

Climate change concern has been around for longer than I thought !


Also note how climate change was apparently an "old, old question" even back in 1907 !

Henry Hatfield's Spectrohelioscope - 1985

I love this whole video, from the subject matter, to the pace of Henry Hatfield's delivery, a classic.

Thank you to the amateur astronomer Martin Mobberley for putting this video on YouTube.

N.B. If you ever want to read a great biography about the late great Sir Patrick Moore, Martin has written the definitive story of his life. (two volumes)
www.amazon.co.uk/Martin-Mobberley

Well worth reading.

Trawling the old photos

Staying at home for obvious reasons at the moment, with plenty of time on my hands to trawl through some old astronomy pictures and sketches.

Over the next few days/weeks/Months! I will put on several posts of bygone astro images.

Here are a few to start with:

Above photo showing the projection method of observing the Sun. 

The telescope used was a 6 inch Tal2 reflector, a great white light solar scope. 

Also really good for observing Saturn.

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Notice the four distinct craters along the terminator between the five and six o'clock positions:

Crater names: from left to right: Furnerius, Petavius, Vendelinus, Langrenus  (the chain of four).

Best seen around third day after a New Moon.

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Above photo taken at a friends smallholding, some five years ago.. I think! 

I wrote an Englyn poem to compliment the photo.

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Final image, a sunspot picture I took, using my trusty old Tal1 reflector. 

It may have only been a 4 inch reflector, but it delivered some beautiful views of the Sun (with proper filters fitted.) 

Plus some great views of Mars at opposition.

Sadly though, this telescope was not much use for observing Jupiter. 

Clear Skies, Stay safe.

First sunspot of the year - for me at least.

You can just make out the spot, just off centre of the image.

Granted not the best picture, but I'm happy just to be outside solar imaging again.

The little 70mm refractor is not that brilliant for solar photography, especially if your aim is good quality solar photos, but it is ideal for projecting and sketching the sunspots.

November the 7th 2019  was the last time time I viewed a sunspot, happy to see one today.

Lets hope 2020 reveals many more sunspots..