FreeLists / az-observing / [AZ-Observing] M74 Last Saturday Night

["Tom Polakis" <polakis@xxxxxxx>]

AJ's unofficial count has 14 people seeing all 110 Messier objects last
Saturday night -- 15 if you include one person who didn't get the form in
on time.  That means all of these people managed to see M74, which had to
have been at the very end of its observing window.  I wonder if folks can
describe what they saw.

For the first two objects, I dragged my scope 50 feet away from my car to
gain a western horizon that was unimpeded by camper shells and tents.  I
also set up my laptop computer running MegaStar at a spot next to my
10-inch scope, and zoomed in on a 1-degree star field around M74.  A
couple faint field stars pointed roughly toward the position of M74, where
the faint, barely non-stellar core of the galaxy turned up.  I could never
see the surrounding haze of the spiral arms in my scope, though next to
me, Frank Kraljic's scope hinted at it.

M74 only became visible when the last detectable twilight had descended
from the western sky.  It remained visible for five minutes or so before
abruptly fading as it shone through more horizon crud.  I wonder if it
would have been visible on the night of the 30th.  As everybody noticed,
M77 was downright easy thanks to its very bright core.

Tom

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