[AZ-Observing] Observing Report from Griffin Ranch May 30, 2011

  • From: L Knauth <Knauth@xxxxxxx>
  • To: AZ Observing List <az-observing@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
  • Date: Fri, 3 Jun 2011 13:10:52 -0700

Observing Report from Griffin Ranch May 30, 2011

        Last Monday night I went to Ken Sike’s and Bill Van Orden’s little 
knoll just northeast of the EVAC Griffin Ranch site to specifically take a look 
at the goings-on toward the core of our galaxy.  The night was calm and 
incredibly clear with a SQM-L zenith reading of 21.67 around 10 pm.  I chased 
galaxies on my observing list while the horizontal Milky Way above the eastern 
horizon rolled up toward the meridian.  When Antares finally culminated, I put 
in a new 21 mm Ethos on the 25” Obsession and began a journey into the spiral 
arm of stars, dust, and gas between us and the galactic core.  Little did I 
know that it would yield the most emotionally overwhelming observing encounter 
in the 55 years I have been scouring the deep night sky. 
        After marveling at M4 where loose star chains give the impression of a 
great unwinding caused by some disrupting influence, I slew east toward the 
dark interstellar clouds and faint steely gray obscuration that starts just to 
the east.  Tiny globular cluster N 6144 is the last peep at something distant. 
It looks to me like its eastern side is dimmed by the encroaching murk and the 
field stars largely vanish as I scan eastward.  Chasing the meridian along its 
intersection down the slanting length of westward moving Scorpius, I make 
repeated diversions to admire clusters and even get a fascinating high power 
view of the intricately detailed Bug Nebula.  The seeing is so good tonight I 
can stoke up the power even at this low altitude. 
        Around 2 am, the galactic core reaches the meridian and I throw off all 
pretense of observing catalogued objects systematically.  I pull off the drive 
clutches, grab the truss and just sweep slowly, field by field with the Ethos 
21.  I am startled to see an immense glowing veil of background stars appear, 
each a little infinitesimal point of light.  They are so numerous that there is 
hardly space between them.  It isn’t just the amorphous glow typical of this 
region that you get in a smaller scope or in a brighter sky; it is a glow made 
up of uncountable discrete points of light that I have never before seen as 
such. Against this background of blazing pinpoints, the brighter, closer stars 
form a separate and noticeably less numerous population.  But the astounding 
thing is the dark stringers, elongated patches, and discrete blobs of jet-black 
obscuring clouds of all sizes and shapes silhouetted against this luminous 
curtain.  We’ve all seen the big ones in binocs, but here is telescopic field 
after field of stringy jet black filaments, swirls, and patches sharply 
delineated against the stellar multitude--all spangled with pinpoint foreground 
stars of various brightness and subtle colors.  The intricate boundaries and 
shapes of the dark clouds are beyond comprehension and certainly beyond verbal 
description.  Just when you get your breath from one view, the next one moves 
in with even more spectacular, infinite detail.  It goes on and on, field after 
field.  The number of stars seen in one gulp continually astonishes.  Then, 
obscuring strands appear that have that steely gray sheen indicating they are 
reflecting starlight or actually glowing in H alpha.  They are especially 
noticeable when they appear in contrast with or grade into jet black 
counterparts in the same field. For nearly an hour, I can only marvel, gasp, 
and exult over what I am seeing.  I put in a 13mm Ethos and find even more 
detail in these dark networks!  Unbelievable!  I have swept these areas a 
hundred times with my old 12.5” and even twice with the 25”, but never with 
eyepieces like these or on a night like this.  This is all new and glorious. 
For an interval, I feel like I am on top of the Mount Everest of amateur 
astronomy.  Even of human existence. How many human eyes have seen sights like 
this?  Who even imagines it is possible?  I think this might even choke up a 
person without a soul.  All the effort to acquire the biggest transportable 
optics, to bleed bucks for the best eyepieces, to get everything working, and 
to opportunistically travel to distant dark sky locations when conditions are 
right is here yielding a payoff beyond what dreams are made of.
        M7 moves into the field and I see it in palpable 3D in front of more 
distant innumerable stars seen around and through this brilliant cluster. The 
uniquely ring-shaped dark cloud Barnard 294 floats into a 13mm Ethos field with 
the background stars shining in the middle hole with undiminished intensity.  
What vagaries of history led to this shape?  Peculiar star cluster NGC 6451 
with its big vacant lane running down the middle appears.  The ambient 
background stars are absent in this band, and it has a barely visible gray 
sheen relative to some of the inky black clouds in the vicinity.  This all 
gives a visceral impression that the lane is not an absence of stars but rather 
obscuration by a thin dark filament floating somewhere between here and there.  
And so it goes.
        At length, the climax along the meridian is over. The low-lying 
galactic center is now rapidly sinking into the southwest and more long-lived 
Milky Way skies are rotating into view.  I do the usual peeks at M8, the 
Trifid, and M17.  All are mind-boggling views, but I am exhausted and still 
reeling from the ecstatic stellar drenching just passed.  It is coming up on 3 
am, the sky is already brightening, and I am too old to continue on, great 
night that it is.  I wake up around noon to wind and clouds.  Still seared and 
shell-shocked by cosmic views of unsurpassed splendor, the afternoon drive back 
through Globe and into the Phoenix Valley is bewildering,
        I have been searching deep photos of these regions on the web tonight 
and am astonished at the inadequacy of how they represent what you can actually 
see at higher magnification.  While the photos certainly indicate the star 
density, the stars are little blebs and clots typically touching one another. 
Ugly. The dark clouds loose much of their definition and the small delicate 
filaments are lost in the overexposed clutter.  It is altogether different and 
vastly more spectacular in reality.  Seeing is believing.  I now burn to repeat 
the experience at an even darker, higher site and under even better skies.  
North Rim?
        There is no evidence of any obscuring material in NGC 6451 in the 
tiresome photos I have seen tonight.  There is, however, an extensive, linear 
black cloud extending right up to the edge of the cluster.  I remain suspicious 
that there is more to this cluster than stars.  AJ Crayon has a nice sketch in 
the DSOG and Steve Coe devotes a page in his DSO book to this cluster with its 
peculiar dividing raceway. 

Videmus Stellae!!

Paul Knauth--
See message header for info on list archives or unsubscribing, and please 
send personal replies to the author, not the list.

Other related posts:

  1. Home
  2. az-observing
  3. Archive
  4. 06-2011