Editorial

A new Johannesburg Centre year starts with some really sad news. One of our most illustrious and long standing members, Danie Overbeek, passed away last week. A most vigorous and esteemed observer of Variable Stars, he was the regular contributor of the Variable of the Month articles until his unfortunate illness earlier in the year. Our thoughts are with Danie's family at this time.

You once again have a new committee and the new office bearers will be formally allocated their posts at the next monthly committee meeting and announced our meeting on the 8^th of August. The committee members are shown in the table below, with their proposed duties for the year to come. We are all bound to benefit from the new blood in the committee.

Eben van Zyl continues his fascinating exploration of Life in the Universe, with an article which delves into the ages of the stars. I'm enjoying this series and will be sorry when it reaches its conclusion. These articles could quite easily be edited together into a guide to the universe for the new ( and even more experienced ) astronomer and give them good insight into the whole saga of life in our universe.

Evan Dembskey has supplied us with our variable of the month, Sco X-1 (V818 Sco). Included you will find a table of observations by Berto Monard and Peter Nelson of South Africa and Australia respectively. You're encouraged to observe and report on this interesting x-ray binary.

Dave Gordon has supplied an interesting guideline for, as he puts it, "A Cluster Hop Around The Body of the Scorpion". It makes for interesting reading, and is also very practical it it's approach. If you follow the advice contained therein, you can have a most enjoyable evening exploring Scorpius. Brian Fraser has supplied us with the Heavenly Happenings for the next 2 months; and several items about the June 21^st eclipse, including pointers to some websites covering the event, are contained in this issue.

The speaker for August is Trevor Gould who will be presenting a talk on meteorite recovery in South Africa, especially as regards the last expedition on the subject, and also, no doubt, covering the next one, which is planned for later in the year.  Together with, or should I say after Trevor's talk, we will have a general discussion on eclipse experiences from the June 21st Eclipse.   So any of you who were there, come prepared to have your say.

What would you like to read about in Canopus? Please drop your editor a line on any subject(s) you'd like to see, or even better … if you have an article you'd like to submit, send it through. I can almost guarantee you it'll be published as is.

The Editor - chris@penberthy.co.za

 The 2001/2 Committee of the Johannesburg Centre