May 16, 5am - the morning of the lunar eclipse. I had just crawled out of a nice warm bed to pop outside for a quick peek at the Earth’s shadow cast on the surface of the moon. The thermometer in the observatory was taunting me with a 5° Celsius smirk. I shivered and wrapped the scarf tighter around my neck and pulled the beanie further down over my freezing ears. As the middle of the eclipse approached, I began to realise that this was one of the darkest lunar eclipses I had yet seen. A spur of the moment decision: I had better take a picture of this!
Frantically, I unwrapped the telescope from its bed clothes and set about attaching the focal reducer, camera adapter and T-mount. I realised the camera was in the main house so I dashed back to retrieve it. Panting and back in the observatory, I realised the cable-release was also in the house – dash number two. I wrestled with the scope and camera, trying to align and focus on a rapidly westward descending moon that was now languishing in full umbra. Panic stations: what exposure time for this very dark eclipse? Dash number three back into the house to retrieve Michael Covington’s "Astrophotography for the Amateur". I groaned as Covington declared 1 – 3 minutes exposure. I had a mere 10 or so minutes before the moon settled behind the westward wall of the observatory.
Astronomy IS exciting. One never knows what opportunities and surprises the celestial sphere has to offer. Whereas, there are obvious benefits to careful pre-planning for a night with the telescope, there is no reason why one shouldn’t try unrehearsed and impromptu experiments.
There is a tremendous personal satisfaction in recording what your eye has fleetingly witnessed, whether it be using photographic film, digital cameras, web cameras or even simply sketching on a piece of paper. In fact, the last method leaves the greatest and longest impression because it is as the mind’s eye has interpreted the celestial image.
It was during my early days in astronomy that I spend many hours simply plotting the brighter constellations on separate pieces of paper, viewing each star separately through the telescope, then painstakingly labelling the stars from a star chart. Those self drawn charts (some quite amusing to look back on now, I might add) assisted me immensely in learning the constellations.
A few evenings back I was out taking a picture of the last quarter moon. While thumbing through a star chart to verify that Achernar in Eridanus, was in fact the bright star rising in the south, I realised that I had never visually identified the constellation of Indus, the Indian. Just four stars make up this rather faint T-shaped constellation, yet I was surprised at how easy it was to identify the Indian nestling amongst its feathered friends: the crane, the peacock and the toucan. A little further background reading revealed that, at only 11,3 light years away, epsilon Indi is one of the closest stars to the sun and one considered a likely candidate for hosting a planetary system. In 1972, the Copernicus Satellite searched unsuccessfully for laser signals from this star.
Talking about opportunities and surprises, by the time you read this, shuttle astronaut, Marsha Ivins will have presented a talk to members of the society at a breakfast on the 28 May. This was an impromptu opportunity that we were only able to secure after you had already received the May edition of Canopus. For those members who knew nothing about it, now may be a good time to subscribe to the ASSA mailing list advertised on page three of this magazine each month, or at least visit the web site from time to time.
There are already four star parties scheduled for you (Montrose, Skeerpoort, Lady Grey and Richtersveld). In addition, we have a ASSA home clean-up scheduled for 21st June, a centenary to celebrate, a Mars closest approach in August, astronomy beginners classes before every monthly meeting, a planetarium treat this month, a line-up of fascinating speakers for the months ahead … and no doubt, a host of impromptu things astronomical that you will only get to know about by staying in touch.
Most astronomers follow the wisdom of philosopher Yogi Berra, who observed "You can see a lot by looking. Although looking is no guarantee of seeing something, not looking will always ensure not seeing!"
Dave Gordon