Hydrogen-alpha - July 7th 2022.

"Frequently consider the connection of all things in the universe... 

We should not say 'I am an Athenian' or 'I am a Roman' but 'I am a citizen of the Universe".

Marcus Aurelius

HIYA POEM - Hot Day.

A HIYA Poem written under a tree on a glorious hot day in June.

For clarification of  Hiya poetry, please refer to one of my old blog posts:

https://pembsastronomer.blogspot.com/2022/05/

Now that's what you call a filament!

Look at the size of this beauty... to date, my best capture of a filament.

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What is a filament?

Solar filaments are clouds of ionized gas above the solar surface squeezed between magnetic regions of opposite polarity. Being cooler and denser than the plasma underneath and their surroundings, they appear as dark lines when seen on the solar disk. 

  SpaceWeatherLive.com - website

Contrails vs Chemtrails.

Chemtrails or contrails, which is it ?  or maybe both!

All I know is that this morning the skies above our village are littered with the tell tale signature of criss-crossing transatlantic aeroplanes.   

Is it possible that our governments are spraying us with mind altering chemicals, disease inducing pathogens?

From an astronomers point of view, those blasted skytrails will, over the course of the day spread out and form a thin film of haze over the entire sky.  

That haze can linger into late evening, resulting in noticeable dimming and slight blurring of the stars.

As we all know, during the Covid lockdowns, the Iceland volcano eruption of 2010, and the Twin Tower attack of 911, all aeroplanes were temporarily grounded. 

Within those small windows of no flight, I observed a marked improvement in astronomical seeing. The stars and star clusters were much better defined. The Moon craters appeared sharper.

Contrails vs Chemtrails

Personally I'm on the side of the astronomer Bob Berman. Who's quote, can be found on the Wikipedia Chem trail page.

Astronomer Bob Berman has characterized the chemtrail conspiracy theory as a classic example of failure to apply Occam's razor, writing in 2009 that instead of adopting the long-established "simple solution" that the trails consist of frozen water vapour, "the conspiracy web sites think the phenomenon started only a decade ago and involves an evil scheme in which 40,000 commercial pilots and air traffic controllers are in on the plot to poison their own children."^[52]

Have a read of Wikipedia's take on the Chem trail theory.  wiki/Chemtrail Theory

Today a giant prominence.

The sky was mostly clouded this morning, but a few gaps appeared. 

This photo was taken at 09h45m UT. 

Within a few minutes you could easily see the structure slowly changing shape.  

It was amazing to see this life giving solar flare change shape in "real time".

Cycle 25 definitely has many surprises in store. Today giant flares, tomorrow countless sunspots, lightbridges, filaments and plages.  

That's the wonder of solar observing... everyday is different. 

Solar - 19/05/22

The most wonderful discovery made by scientists is science itself. 

Jacob Bronowski

No show Perseids 2009 - Hello to HIYA poetry.

Originally I wrote this back in August of 2009. 

It was going to be a post about meteors, but ended up as an introduction to a poetry form that I'd been mulling over for several months.

Vincent van Gogh

Up on the Preseli Hills:

Two camper vans, tea and cakes, plus guitars, harmonicas, and several good friends, we waited for the night to unfold.

We were all hoping to see the Perseid shower at its maximum that evening, but the Pembrokeshire sky had different ideas, we ended up with total cloud cover for the entire evening.

No matter, we still had good company, lots of tea and cake and we spent several hours talking, laughing and playing guitars.

At about 3.00 am I lay awake peeping at Jupiter through a gap in the cloud, but still no meteors. 

With no meteors to concentrate on, my mind turned to poetry matters, namely the syllabic count of haiku.

Whilst pondering the poetical, I slowly fell back to sleep; a haiku style seed was germinating.

Hello to HIYA.

That morning I had an idea for a poetry form that might be of interest to poets, I call it HIYA. *

Firstly you make a chart as follows:

Then you choose any word you want to make your poem.

For example I will use the letters of my name:  MARK.

Look up each letter of your word on the above chart.  

Write down the corresponding number you see above it.

My word MARK would read as follows:
M=4, A=1, R=9, K=2

Once you correspond a number to each of your letters, you then use this number as a syllable count for each line of your poem.

Poem for the Perseids

                                                                                               Syllable Count

Throughout the night                 4         M

Clouds                               1         A

Rest upon the Preseli hill tops      9         R
I sigh.                              2         K

Any word or combination of words can be used, plus the poem can be split up into any length verse you see fit. 

Have a go, see what you think.

Have a guess what my initial word was in this poem. 

Tea Party for the Perseids

We sit so patiently waiting

Surrounded by clouds

Time for tea

Time for cake

Time to talk with old friends.

That evening back in August of 2009 may not of revealed any meteors, but I'm glad it revealed the HIYA.

*Why is it call it HIYA?

As a child, there was a lady I once knew, who lived at the end of my grandmother's street.

Everytime she spotted me walking past she would shout out "HIYA" at the top of her voice.

Her voice was high and loud !.. I would often be startled out of my daydreaming as I walked past her window.

Plus HIYA sounds a bit like HAIKU.