[AZ-Observing] Re: Marathon: Early Report

Impressive.
Stan

Tom Polakis wrote:

>The night turned out to be about 75% cloudy, but that didn't stop quite a few 
>of us from running the marathon.  Somebody counted 110 or so vehicles, which 
>isn't bad for such an obviously murky night.  I heard a couple reports of 107, 
>but no perfect scores yet.  I would not be dubious, though, as somebody could 
>have looked at M74 or M30 at the right instant as it passed between clouds.
>
>Here's my personal account.  I saw 105 Messier objects last night.  It was one 
>my the most challenging nights of observing.
>
>I failed to see M74, but it was in the clear for a few minutes when it was 
>dark enough, so maybe a larger aperture than 70mm would have pulled it in.  In 
>the early evening, it was apparent that the north was going to go away fast, 
>so I worked on sweeping up all of the object of high declination through Ursa 
>Major before even going after Orion through Puppis, where it was very clear.  
>M33 was extremely difficult and fleeting, and I bet a lot of folks missed it.  
>I wonder if anybody got M31 and its two companions.  I had to wait until 
>morning, when I failed to see it again.
>
>I did all of my viewing at 18x in the Pronto, so some objects like M76 took 
>real effort to detect.  And some galaxies between clouds were tougher than I 
>was expecting.  All of the open clusters in Messiers catalogue were beautimous 
>in the little refractor.
>
>At 10:20, it had cleared completely, and stayed good for a couple hours, when 
>I was able to cruise through the galaxies in Virgo and Coma.  At 11:00, I had 
>61 objects, and napped through 3:00, when I was greeted by more mostly cloudy. 
> I took on the last dozen objects in a strange order, dictated entirely by 
>local clearings.  I managed to see M73 but not M72, doing the same for M55, 
>while missing M75.  I was able to get M72 and M75 just before twilight, and 
>just barely.
>
>I could believe that M30 also became visible at some point, but I was messing 
>with M72 at the time and didn't get to it.  So I wound up with 105, missing 
>M74, M31, M32, M110, and M30.  Glad I made the trip, as it was an enjoyable 
>night.
>
>I hope some other observers had a chance to point the scope at the rising 
>crescent moon, which looked great when the bands of clouds were passing in 
>front of it.
>
>Tom
>
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