Hello and welcome to the BAA blog. We had another virtual stargazing event with Penn Dixie on June 26th — here’s a recap of what we saw and imaged. This post is only a small sample of what was shown, so if you’d like to watch an archive of the stream, it’s available on Penn Dixie’s Facebook page here.
Moon Views Galore
The moon was waxing this week, nearly approaching first quarter, so many BAA members were able to show live views through their telescopes. Ernie ended up taking some captures to combine into a single photo:
(click on the image to see a larger view)
Dan ended up producing an image as well, of asteroid 2Pallas. The while blur at the center is the asteroid, moving over a period of minutes.
(click on the image to see a larger view)
Some other portions of the program involved Mark from the Williamsville Space Lab Planetarium describing the visuals of a lunar eclipse, and Tim from the Buffalo Museum of Science showing viewers the Summer Triangle — an asterism formed by bright stars Vega, Deneb, and Altair which is visible during the summer months:
(click on the images to see a larger view)
Besides Tim and Mark, we also had Phil and Paul join in from from Penn Dixie, who were able to answer viewer questions (and provide relief to BAA members when clouds intervened.)
If you ever want to get live answers from an astronomer, you should try joining in at the next Virtual Stargazing night. Our next event will be on July 18th — we are hoping to feature views from our own Beaver Meadow Observatory this time! It will also be close to new moon, when deep-sky objects are best viewed. Hope to see many viewers in the next stream!
-Emilyann
