[sac-forum] Re: Call for Observatioins
- From: "David Hofland" <hofland@xxxxxxx>
- To: <sac-forum@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Mon, 28 Jul 2008 08:01:56 -0500
Will send Draco observations if we can get some clear skies here. Its been
terrible since last month, but this weeks forecast has a couple nights in the
next week that just might luck out. We'll see.
David Hofland
Director, Student Services
College of Nursing and Health Sciences
Jacksonville State University
256.782.5276
----- Original Message -----
From: AJ Crayon
To: SAC Forum
Sent: Friday, July 25, 2008 10:43 PM
Subject: [sac-forum] Call for Observatioins
I know the weather isn't cooperating with us and I'm not trying to twist the
knife, really I'm not :)), but I thought it worthwhile to post the observing
schedule anyhow. I've included the current one, Draco, because I need the
observations in about a week or 10 days for the newsletter. You've already
seen Sagittarius, but Cygnus is the new one.
The next month's selection will be Draco. There is quite a bit here to
choose from, especially since it crosses many lines of Right Ascension. Here
we will keep to the region around the head of the dragon and find them all,
save one, galaxies. The magnitude range for the galaxies is 9.9 to 12th. The
first selection is NGC6140 a nice elongated barred spiral. Next jump is to
NGC6340 a nearly face-on early type spiral. There are other galaxies in the
field. Can you count and identify them? The Draco Dwarf, UGC10822 and a
member of the Local Group of Galaxies, is next and its magnitude is listed as
9.9. Beware this can be misleading because its size is 33.5'X18. 9'and that
gives it a low surface brightness. You might try to ferret out some detail
with averted vision while waiting for a moment of good seeing. Continuing on
our way finds NGC6412 a barred spiral with some detail. Again, try to get as
much out of this one as you can. Our last galaxy is NGC6654, at 12th mag. Not
clear, to me, if it has some faint stars involved or bright HII regions. What
do you think? Finally comes an asterism named after Fr. Lucian Kemble called
Kemble 2 and located at RA 18h35.0m Dec +72° 23'. It is 7th mag, 30' and forms
a ''Mini-Cassiopeia'' like asterism.
The September selection is Sagittarius, up for its third appearance. Most of
the objects will be from the Messier Catalog, but not all. We will keep with
some of the lesser-viewed globular clusters and save the more popular ones for
another time. Our search begins with M 69 that has stars from 14th to 16th
mag. What is smallest telescope that can see the well-resolved nature of this
object? On July 22, 1995, just 15' west of southwest of where Comet Hale-Bopp
was discovered is the next selection - M 70. Still within the body of the Tea
Pot asterism is the very bright M 54. Now moving more towards the east is M
55, the brightest globular cluster so far. Continuing to the northeast part of
the constellation is the planetary nebula NGC6818, often called the Little Gem
Nebula. Can you detect it's slight elongation of 22"X15"? The last entry is
nearby, NGC6822 also known as Barnard's Galaxy and a Member of the Local Group
of Galaxies. It has a surface brightness of mag 14.5 but is still viewable is
telescopes smaller than 8". Look for the bright HII region.
For October the observations will come from the Swan Cygnus and will start
with the cluster NGC6819 that has over 100 stars from 11th mag. Should be
quite pretty. Next is a selection from Sky and Telescopes' Deep Sky Wonders
authored by Sue French. It's an asterism called the Fairy Ring that is a
gathering of pretty faint stars, including some doubles and interesting stellar
colors. It is located at R.A. 20h 04.1m Dec +38° 14' is round and about 20'.
Let us know what colors you see. Nearby is NGC6888 a 10th mag nebula that
should be large, pretty bright and elongated. The next nearby entry is an open
cluster NGC7044. This Herschel 400 entry is large, rich and faint with stars
from 15th to 18th mag. Moving 1.5° almost due south of Gamma (g) Cygni is
Berkeley 86 and its 30 stars from mag 9.5. The last of the Herschel 400
entries is NGC6910 in the Gamma (g) Cygni nebulosity. It is another open
cluster with about 50 stars and should be easily found. Last is M 39 This
bright, large, loose cluster should be easily found.
AJ Crayon
Phoenix, AZ
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